Accompany
by Bad Lifetime Movies
Summary: "Did you honestly think I would betray the Doctor? For you?" I scoffed. "The Doctor and Rose are my family- The TARDIS is my home and nothing you do to me- no matter what promises you make, I will never forget that." When the Doctor and Rose set out to protect a family from a hungry alien, they never imagined the consequences. I just so happened to be that consequence.
1. Linnie

_You only lose what you cling to._  
\- Budha

* * *

I sighed and shoved my hands into my pockets as I stared out at the scene in front of me. My brother and Samantha held each other as they cried, with my grandfather standing next to them with tears in his own eyes. I had never seen him cry before.

People stood around the long, black coffin as the preacher spoke in front of the large picture that sat next to the coffin. Mostly everyone looked sad, some were even crying while others gave my stepmother pitying looks. It wasn't easy losing a daughter who was so young- not that I'd know.

"We have to go now." The Doctor said coming up beside me and I shoved my hands into the pockets of my jacket.

"I know." I sighed. "But it's not everyday that you get to go to your own funeral."

* * *

 **L-I-N-N-I-E**

She was just another adventure to them, but when the Doctor and Rose set out to protect a family from a hungry alien, they must deal with the consequences. Linnie Willows just so happened to be that consequence.

* * *

 **A WEEK EARLIER**

"Maybe I shouldn't go." I said as I felt Leo's head. He was still a little warm and I just knew that Fiona wouldn't be able to handle it herself if Leo got worse.

"We'll be fine." Fiona assured me and I gave her a look. "I'm serious."

"You do realize that if he vomits, you have to clean it up, right?" I crossed my arms and her face fell at the realization. "No calling me at work- or Samantha. She can't afford to miss another shift because you don't want to get vomit on your hands." If I was being honest, I was actually trying to talk Fiona into chickening out. My boss, John, was pretty understanding when it came to me skipping work to stay home with Leo whenever I needed. He had kids, so he knew that kids got sick and hurt a lot- plus, John new that my stepmother, Samantha, couldn't stay home since she had a pretty strict boss as the hospital. "And you can't just leave it here until one of us gets home."

Despite her lapse, Fiona shook her head. "We'll be fine."

After getting a couple more reassurances, I finally grabbed my bag and left the house.

"Where have you been?" My co-worker, Angela, asked as soon as I came into view. "My shift was over ten minutes ago." I didn't resist the urge to roll my eyes when she flipped back her long red hair and studied her freshly manicured nails. I couldn't stand Angela; she hated working here at the shack and tried to make everyone's lives as miserable as she thought hers was. In reality, Angela Riniman was the spoiled teenage daughter of a tech mogul. She only worked at the Shack because she drove her car into it last year and John told her parents he'd keep it quiet if they paid to have the Shack fixed and had Angela work as a form of community service- which, of course, she wouldn't be paid for.

"I'm sure the angels are weeping for you" I mocked as I moved behind the counter and she glared at me. "And considering you once came in drunk and broke the soda machine- which I had to stay late and clean up, by the way," I said pointedly as I dropped my bag and began unbuttoning my button down. "You can handle not driving away in your Malibu Barbie convertible for a few extra minutes."

Angela rolled her eyes as she grabbed her overpriced purse and left the Shack. Deciding not to waste anymore of my time on her attitude, I pulled off my button up and got to work.

It wasn't long after I started my shift that things started to get busier; I worked from noon until closing- a pretty long shift to be honest, but I took whatever hours John could give me considering that Stephanie and I were still paying off my hospital bills from when I had an appendectomy a couple of year ago. Surgery had not been cheap- plus, John knew I could handle it; I had been working at the Shack since I was fifteen.

After a couple of hours, things still hadn't slowed down since all the surfers, tanners and families were all done with their beach activities and crowded onto the patio for snacks or dinner. I had just finished making a little girl an ice cream cone and decided to make one for myself since there was no one else waiting for orders. It wouldn't be long before someone else turned up, or some mess had to be cleaned up, but- for now- I had a break.

"Hello," A voice said from behind me. A very British sounding voice.

Turning around, I came face to face with a girl; she was around my age with blonde hair, brown eyes, and a wide smile. She had a bit of a wild look to her with messy hair and the dingy tank top she wore. The man next to her had buzzed brown hair, matching eyes and very big ears. For a reason I couldn't think of, he was wearing a black shirt underneath a leather jacket. With the weather in Florida, I was surprised he hadn't passed out yet. They were both covered in sand, but we were on a beach; I was guessing that they fell.

"Hi," I straightened up. for some reason they looked familiar. "You two want something?" I asked, nodding back at the painted, wooden menu board above my head.

The man sat up and shook his head. "No, we'll just be going." He was British, too. Why did his voice sound so familiar? I'd never met a British person in my life. Maybe I saw him on TV...but that wouldn't explain why they _both_ looked familiar.

Standing up, the man made to leave, but the girl grabbed him by the sleeve of his jacket. "We tried it your way," She told him as he allowed himself to be pulled back onto the stool. "Now, it's my turn." It was a bit hard to understand her with her accent. "I'm Rose." She introduced. "Rose Tyler. This is the Doctor." Doctor who?

"Doctor..." I trailed off, but she just shook her head.

"Just the Doctor." She said. "He refuses to tell me his real name." Okay...

"I'm Linnie." I replied. "So, if you're not here to eat or drink-"

Rose interrupted me. "We're looking for someone." She said. "Red hair, nearly six feet, lots of piercings?"

I scoffed. "Try meeting someone without some kind of piercing at this job;I have nine." But then I shook my head. "I've never seen anyone like that around here. Sorry."

The man- Doctor whatever-his-name-was, looked at me with furrowed eyebrows. "Why're you half dressed?" Looking down at the high-waisted fraying cut-off shorts and pink rainbow halter top I wore, I didn't even hesitate to give my answer.

"Well, it's ninety-five degrees and there are two different restaurants on this beach," I informed him. "Which one are you gonna go to? The one with the half-dressed hot girl or the one with the the wannabe surfer who wears a red speedo, ends every sentence with ' _know what I'm sayin'?_ ' and smells exclusively like low tide?" Feeling that the ice cream was melting onto my hand, I turned around to get a napkin. That's when I heard Rose speak again.

"Doctor," She began quietly, thinking I couldn't hear. "Didn't you say this thing could change what it looks like?"

"I'm sorry, what?" I asked, turning around to face them, but they were already headed away from the Shack. Shaking my head, I made myself another ice cream cone and picked up the magazine that Angela had left. I didn't have time to humor crazy tourists

* * *

Because a few midnight surfers got hungry, I was at the Shack for at hour after closing, but I didn't mind.

By the time I put the money from the register into the safe in John's office, my feet were killing me, so I pulled off my wedges, hoping the sidewalks were clean enough for me to walk barefooted on.

Normally, on my walk to and from the bus stop, I felt safe and secure; there were usually one or two restaurants that still had lights on and a few people still hung around on the streets. However, that was at midnight; it was one in the morning now, which changed everything.

There were no businesses or apartments above with lights on and anyone still left on the street were either homeless or put me on edge. Because of this, I was walking fast that normal which made me paranoid- so paranoid that I was imagining things; I could swear that there was someone walking behind me. I was hearing a dragging sound and- what was that?...Clicking?

The further I got down the street, the louder the clicking got and my heart was beating wildly in my chest. Afraid, I sped up, only to hear that the dragging sound did too. This was not how I wanted to die.

I was just about to start running, hoping that whatever was following me couldn't catch me, but before I could even take another step, a hand shout out from the alley. It grabbed me by the arm and pulled me into a hard chest- silencing me with a hand over my mouth before I could even think of screaming.

"Don't scream." An accented voice whispered and I immediately recognized it as the man from the Shack. My hands immediately grabbed at the one on my mouth, trying to pull it away, but that was when I heard the ticking sound get louder. Whatever it was, it was getting closer.

My eyes widened as a very skinny body walked past the alleyway. It's skin was a nasty gray color and looked like it was wet and droopy. It had long legs, arms and fingers that skimmed the ground from where the shoulders started at least five feet above the ground. Whatever it was, it wasn't human.

Suddenly, the thing stopped and lifted its head, giving a better view of it's ugly face with the light coming down from the lamppost. It slowly turned around and my eyes widened as I saw the large white ovals that were its eyes.

 _'I'm gonna die.'_ I thought. _'After nineteen years of life, this is how I die; in an alley with a stranger's hand over my mouth.'_

But that didn't happen because the thing looked in my general direction for a few moments before turning back around and continuing down the street. I heard two people exhale; one from behind me and one from beside, but I was still rigid.

"Doctor..." A girls voice said from next to me. It must've been the girl from earlier- Rose.

"What?" Rose must've pointed out that the man, the Doctor, still had his hand over my mouth because he quickly removed his hand with an; "Oh."

I didn't move, still trying to process everything, but I felt the Doctor behind me and Rose come from beside me to stand in front of me, but I wasn't very focused on them. It was like I was seeing them, but wasn't at the same time.

"Doctor, I think she's in shock." The Rose said in a thick accent, making it slightly hard for me to understand her. A hand waved in front of my face until it was smacked away. "Stop that!"

"You're the one who said she was in shock!" The Doctor reminded her, but I didn't care about their bickering.

"Maybe we should get her out of here." Rose suggested. "Before that thing comes back."

That's what led us to the front window booth at _Hossie's_ , a small cafe downtown at midnight. I sat on one side of the booth, staring at the light golden color of my coffee as I stirred it. Rose and the Doctor sat on the other side of the booth. None of us had said anything to each other.

"What was that thing?" I asked quietly. The guy looked surprised that I had spoken.

"A Screech." He answered. "They're nasty creatures from the planet Noveptalinium." I was terrified; partly because some alien had just tried to kill me, but mostly because I was being told it was an alien and I wasn't even surprised.

"Why did it come after me?" He looked to his friend. "Please," I said. "Just tell me."

He didn't look sure, but told me anyway. "Screeches consume family lines." He said. "They probably started long ago with one of your great grandparents. They normally don't eat a member of the line until they reach old age or until they're deathly ill, but..." He looked at the girl before looking back to me. "Your family's Screech probably hasn't had a meal in a while, since your grandmother."

I sucked in a breath. "My grandmother?" I asked before shaking my head and pushing back the hair that had fallen into my face. "No...My grandmother died from cancer when I was a little kid."

The man shook his head. "No," He disagreed. "Your grandmother was suffering from cancer. The Screech, more than likely, consumed her life force before the cancer killed her. They don't like rotting meat." Wait, he said that they didn't eat a family member until they were old or deathly ill. "Is anyone in your family sick?" The Doctor asked. "Screeches usually don't stray from specific family lines- even if they are starving.

"My brother." I told them. "But he's only got a fever and it's going away; Leo gets sick all the time."

The Doctor shook his head. "Your grandmother died when you were a little girl- five years old if I remember right." My eyes furrowed in confusion.

"H-How could you even know that?" I asked looking from him to Rose. Why did they look so familiar. Standing up as much as possible with the table between us, the Doctor leaned over and put two fingers from each of his hands on my temples. For some reason, my eyes immediately closed.

When I opened them, I was no longer sitting in a booth at Hossie's. Instead, I was standing in the hallway of my house- my old house; the one I had lived in with my first stepmother, Samantha, and my father before he left us. I immediately knew it was the hallway outside my bedroom because the beautiful painting that Samantha had painted of me was hanging on the wall. I loved that painting and, at sixteen years old, had cried when we were forced to sell it. Was this a dream?

 _"Samantha," A small voice said and I turned around to see that the door in front of the painting was cracked open, letting a glowing light spill out. Tentatively stepping forward, my hand raised up and slowly pushed open the door a bit so I could see inside._

 _There, under a orange floral comforter laid a girl in a bed that was too big for her Beside her, a woman with flaming red hair held a closed children's book in her lap. I remember wanting my hair to be as bright as a hers considering that I was convinced she was a Phoenix like in the Harry Potter books she used to read me._

 _"Samantha?" I whispered. What the hell was this?_

 _"Yes, sweetie?" She replied, looking down at the little girl who I now realized was me._

 _"Is grandma gonna die?" Little me asked and Samantha shook her head._

 _"I don't know." She lifted her hand up and Little me snuggled into her side. Letting her hand fall down, Samantha began playing with her hair. "She's really sick and very old."_

 _"Grandma is your mommy." Little me pointed out. "Are you gonna be sad if your mommy dies?"_

 _Samantha nodded. "Yeah..." She said. "I would be very sad if my mommy died." Samantha got quiet and Little me broke the silence._

 _"I'd be sad if you died." Samantha didn't say anything, she just kissed Little me on the head before getting up from the bed._

 _"Alright," She said as Little me scooted to the middle of the bed and allowed herself to be tucked in. "Time to go to sleep; you've got school tomorrow and piano lessons after; your dad will not be happy if he gets another call from Ms. La Don because you fell asleep again."_

 _"I don't like the piano." Little me said sleepily with a yawn. "I like my violin, though." Turning off the bedside lamp, Samantha leaned down and kissed little me on the head before putting away the book and making her way towards the door. I moved away just as she opened it, but she didn't see me, despite walking right past me. Not knowing what else to do, I followed her down the hall. She turned two corners before she got to the door she was looking for and simply peaked inside before walking away. I didn't know what to do, so I made to follow her once again when I saw little me creeping down the hallway. She was coming towards me, but I could tell that she couldn't see me._

 _Not wanting to know whether or not she'd pass right through me, I stepped out of the way as she rushed past in some sad attempt at being a ninja and shot straight into the room. I heard a gasp and I quickly made my way into the room to see little me frozen in shock and fear as she stared at the figure leaning over my grandmother._

 _It was gangly and tall- maybe six or so feet- with long limbs which were covered in a slightly translucent gray slime. It's head- which was long and oval shaped with wide round bubbles over its eyes- was lowered only a few inches over my grandmother and its small, wide mouth was open. A white mist was flowing straight out of my grandmothers mouth and into the things._

 _"Grandma!' Little Me yelled and the alien snapped its head towards her. Before it could even take a step, little me let out a little yell as two arms wrapped around her body and lifted her up. I looked to see the blonde girl from the diner- Rose- holding her._

 _"Get her out of here!" The Doctor yelled, from beside her before pulling out a strange, electronic object and pointing it at the Screech._

I gasped as the Doctor dropped his hands down from my head and stared at him and then Rose and then him again.

"Why didn't I remember that?" I asked shakily. "And how the hell do you both look the same?"

"Time travel," The Doctor answered at the same time Rose said, "That's not important." They looked at each other accusingly before looking back to me.

"Time travel?!" I repeated, practically yelling. The Doctor nodded begrudgingly.

"The Screech was there to take the rest of your grandmothers life force before she died. We were there to stop it, but it got a lock on you and it's been after you ever since." I shook my head.

"I've never even seen it before today-"

"They can change their faces," Rose said. "It'd be impossible to tell if you weren't paying attention."

"But why?" I asked. "Why would it be coming after me? What did I do?"

"Nothing that you weren't supposed to." The Doctor assured. "Screeches don't feed to punish- they only feed to satisfy their hunger. You're family...it's small and generations are stretched out which is why it hasn't fed; it's much easier to suck the life force out sick and feeble prey, but I'm not sure about you."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means that I'm not sure why the Screech targeted you in particular; you're no less human than your brother and mother-"

"Stepmother." I corrected immediately. I loved Samantha, I did, and she was my mother in every way except blood. I just didn't have it in me to call her mom.

"So I don't know why it's stayed around all these years."

My eyebrows furrowed. " _Stayed around_?" I repeated and he nodded. "Stayed around where? My house?"

"It would be the easiest place to watch you." Rose said.

"Well, it didn't get me, so does that mean it's going back to my house?" I asked. "My house where my weak and feeble brother is?" The result of my words were instantaneous.

The Doctor's eyes widened just a bit before he got out of the booth and rushed towards the door, leaving both Rose and I to follow him. The waitress would be pissed about us running out on the bill, but I'd come back and pay once my brother wasn't in danger of being eaten.

"Where's he going?!" I yelled to Rose as we ran down the streets after the Doctor.

"Time machine!" She answered as we followed the Doctor into a nearby alley, but the only thing there- other than a bunch of trash cans and a dumpster, was a blue police box. I remembered reading about one in an old book for English class, but I was pretty sure they were only a thing in Britain.

Not bothering to explain himself, the Doctor ran into the box and Rose went in right after him. I, however, being the only sane one decided to not run into the tiny box. Rose must've realized that I wasn't following her anymore because she poked her head out.

"What're you doing?" She asked. "Come on!"

"How?" I asked. "There's barely any space in those things for one person, let alone two and now you want me to go in too? No way!"

"Do you want your little bother to get the life sucked out of him by an alien?" She asked before disappearing into the box. I didn't have a good comeback.

"I'm coming in!" I told them. "Make room!" Deciding that doing it fast would make the process easier, I rushed into the box, only to find myself in a large room with a high ceiling. In the middle of the room was a console with the Doctor was rushing around and pressing random buttons. "How...?...What?!" I shouted. "How is this-"

"It's a time machine." Rose said. "It's called a TARDIS and yes; it's much bigger on the inside."

"Hold on!" The Doctor shouted suddenly and Rose grabbed onto the console as the entire room began to shake. I, however, wasn't so lucky and got thrown to the floor. I tried- unsuccessfully- to get up multiple times, only to fall back onto the ground when everything shook again. I finally managed to pull myself up on the railing and pull myself up the stairs just as the shaking stopped.

"What was that?" I asked as Rose and the Doctor went around the console to meet me.

"Time travel." The Doctor said with a grin before going past me.

"Don't mind him." Rose instructed. "He's a prat."

The Doctor opened the door of the TARDIS before going out, Rose and I followed him and I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw that we were right in front of the bungalow that I lived in. Rose turned back to me when she noticed I had stopped.

"You okay?" She asked and I nodded.

"Just...starting to accept that you were telling the truth about that time travel stuff." I said and continued walking. The Doctor was had been waiting for us at the gate and closed it after we went in.

"We have to be quiet." He informed us. "Screeches can't see, they're born with a casing over their eyes to protect them from sunlight. They mostly navigate through smell and hearing." I went to put my hand on the doorknob of the front door, but Rose quickly grabbed my hand to stop me.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"I think the Screech is already here." She looked at the doorknob and I looked closer and realized that she had seen the gooey, gray substance on the doorknob. The same gooey stuff that was on the screech.

We both looked back at the Doctor who held his finger up to his mouth before moving past us so he was closest to the door. He looked around for a moment before taking my bag and pulled out my button down shirt. He wrapped it around his hand before using it to open the door. Once it was cracked, he dropped my shirt to the ground and I looked to see that the substance was eating right through it.

Motioning for us to keep quiet, the Doctor went into the house first with Rose and I following after him. Rose closed the door and the Doctor look at me.

"It'll be going after your brother." He whispered. "Where is he?"

"Last room at the end of the hall." I told him. "I painted birds on it a few years ago, you can't miss it." The Doctor wasted no time and quickly left the living room and went down the hall with Rose and I on his heels. When he got to my sisters' floral door he once again used my hat to slowly twist the knob and let himself in.

Inside the room, everything was the same; the movie and TV show posters still hang from her wall amidst the framed pictures of both of us growing up along with our parents. There was a basket of recently folded laundry sitting on the settee in front of his bed that I was supposed to put away and a bunch of toys littering the floor that he was supposed to have put away the day before he got sick, but there was one thing that didn't belong.

The tall, long fingered, gray dripping Screech had it's mouth open unnaturally wide and into it was going a golden hued mist that was coming out of Leo's mouth.

"Oh my God!" I whispered covering my mouth. "What is it doing to him?"

"It's draining his life force." The Doctor in formed me, no longer bothering to whisper so I could clearly hear the disgust in his voice.

"It's gold." Rose stated.

"It's in deep." The Doctor said. "The only part of a person's life force that feeds the diet of a Screech is the raw potential and desires of a person. The part of his life force that developed while he was dreaming of dragons and magic."

I turned to him. "Why are you just standing there?" I demanded. "I brought you here for a reason. Do something!"

"There's nothing I can do." He said, sounding resigned. "The Screech has gone too deep. If I pulled it off of her now, your brother's life force would just float into the air and dissolve. "

"And if you don't it off, my brother is going to die." I hissed at him and he shook his head as he looked at me apologetically.

"I'm sorry." He said. "There's nothing I can do for him." It wasn't a moment later that my hand reached up and slapped him across the face. Rose covered her mouth and I glared at the Doctor.

"I am not going to let Leo die! Not today!" I told him before turning away and sprinting into the room. Without even thinking about it I threw my hands out and pushed the Screech away from my brother and stood in between them, ignoring the burning on my hands, as it...well, screeched in my face.

"No!" I heard the Doctor yell, but it didn't change what happened next.

The Screech opened it's mouth wide and my mouth opened on it's own as I felt a tugging deep inside of my body. I felt as if I was going to throw up, but my body just bended to accommodate the path of the substance inside of me as it went rushing through my body and out of my mouth.

/

The Doctor yelled as the Screech began devouring the girls life force and Rose ran over Leo in the bed, whose golden life force was floating out of him as if it were air. Not knowing was to do, she put her hand over the boy's mouth to stop the flow, but it just sprayed out from between her fingers. She couldn't help but notice how hot it was.

"Doctor!" Rose yell, but he was busy searching around the room for something to help him with the plan he concocted in his mind.

He zipped around the room, looking anywhere and everywhere for something that could help him before he spotted a Swiss Army Knife. He rushed over to the teenage girl and the crouching Screech and sliced open the casing on the Screech's eyes. Since it was dark, slicing the casing alone would cause no damage to the Screech, but it only took a dim light to burn their eyes out.

The Doctor took out his sonic screwdriver before putting it in front of the Screech's eyes. It did just the trick.

The Screech once again screeched and the girl fell to the ground as the Screech fell back against the desk a few feet away from the bed and onto the floor.

Rose lifted her hand from Leo's mouth, no longer able to keep the essence from leaving his body. "Doctor!" She rushed over to him, about to ask why he wasn't doing anything to help when she saw what he was staring at.

The Screech convulsed on the floor as it clutched at it's face, trying to shield it's eyes.

"What's happenin' to it?" Rose asked.

The Doctor held no emotion on his face. "Screeches have very big eyes and an intense sensitivity to light. The dullest light could disintegrate their eyes. Their eyes are directly connected to their brains so the heat from their eyes fries their brains."

"Light kills 'em." Rose said as the Screech stopped convulsing and it's long hands dropped from it's face. No long occupied with watching the Screech, Rose looked to the brunette who still lay on the floor and her eyes widened. "Doctor!" She said slapping his arm to get his attention. "What's happening to her?!"

The Screech hadn't taken enough of her life force to get to the golden part with Linnie as it had with her brother, but Leo's essence was no longer floating and dissipating into the air. It was going into the other unconscious person in the room.

"The essence is findin' a new host." The Doctor said in a disbelieving voice. "It's been forced out of one sibling...so it's going into the other.

"What's that gonna do to her?" The Doctor shook his head.

"I have no idea."

\

When I opened my eyes I felt strange.

I felt like a stranger in my own body, like there were parts of me I had only just found. I felt like there was something else, something familiar inside of me. My body felt like it weighed two tons, but felt as light as a feather at the same time. I immediately raised my hands to my face, remembering the burning from when I touched the Screech, but they were fine.

"Hey," A soft voice said and I looked over to see the blonde girl from earlier, Rose, sitting in a wheelchair next to the bed I lay in. She quickly got up. "How are you feelin'?"

I feel..." I started, but shook my head. "Different. What happened?" I asked sitting up.

"I think you'll be happy to hear that you saved your brother." I turned and saw the brown haired guy, the Doctor, lounging in the bed next to me. He quickly got up and made his way over.

"I thought you said he couldn't be saved?" He shook his head.

"He couldn't." He said. "And I don't know how your body is sustaining itself, but it is. It's..incredible."

I furrowed my eyebrows. "What do you mean?"

"I mean that when you fell unconscious, your brother's life force went looking for a new host and found you." He explained. "Your mother told the doctors that your brother had a fever 100.4 degrees yesterday and now he's healthy as a horse."

"How can he still be living if his...life force is in me?" I wondered.

"Because you're incredibly strong." He said. "Your brother is living through you. His life force is burning inside of your body right along with yours, but it shouldn't be. Your body should've shut down and fell into a coma as soon as your brother's life force went into you, but it didn't."

Was he saying what I think he was saying? "Are you saying that Leo's soul is inside of me?"

He nodded. "Call it what you will, but yes. Your brother is going to live a normal life as long as you're alive. He'll live to go to college, get married have kids, grandkids and then he'll die like every other person in the world."

"Where is he?" I asked immediately. "I want to see him. Where is he?" The Doctor looked to Rose who looked away. "What?" I asked.

"You can't see your brother." The Doctor said.

"What do you mean I can't see him?" I scoffed. "You just said he was fine."

"But you're not." Rose said and I furrowed my eyebrows at her. "As long as Leo's life force is inside of you...you can't die."

I shook my head. "I don't understand."

"You can't die." The Doctor repeated. "It's physically impossible for your life force to burn at the same rate as your brother's while they're both inside of you, so your body slowed your aging process to a millionth of it's normal rate. In the simplest way possible; You can't age until your force begins burning at it's normal pace again. What's gonna happen when your brother dies at ninety years old and you still look like a seventeen year old?"

"I'm nineteen." I snapped.

"Doesn't matter." He said with a shrug. "Because you know what's going to happen when you turn fifty and you still look like you do now? The government is going to take you and put you in a lab to run tests because they'll think you're alien and it's going to last for a very long time because you'll have outlived every scientist testing on you."

I wiped my tears away. "So what am I supposed to do?" I asked. "Just runaway? Leave Samantha alone to pay for my hospital bills with her crappy nursing job? Everything I have ever done in my life was for them and now you're telling me that I can't ever see them ever again?"

"You can see them." Rose corrected. "They just can't see you." I looked to the Doctor who shook his head.

"I'm sorry."

"I don't have anywhere to go." I told him. "My stepmom and brother are the only family I have. I don't have any friends because I'm always working and I don't have any money because all of it went to the hospital. So what the hell am I supposed to do?"

"You could come with us." Rose said without hesitation and both the Doctor and I looked to her.

"What?" We chorused and Rose gave the doctor a look.

"We can't leave her here." She told him. "She's got nowhere to go and we're the reason this 'appened to her. That Screech wouldn't have gone after her sister if I had killed it when I had the chance." Rose gave the Doctor a pleading look. "Doctor, please."

/

That's how I ended up here, in the middle of a graveyard, thirty feet away from my own funeral with the Doctor right beside me. He had been kind enough to help me fake my death in a very convincing car crash. The cadaver he had stolen from the medical school not too far away looked a lot like me and since the body had been badly burned, no one said otherwise when multiple people came forward and told the police that it was me in the car.

I had decided to dress up for my own funeral. I borrowed something from the Doctor's giant closet of clothes; a black dress that went to my knees, a black cardigan and one of those small black net veils older women wore with a pair of sunglasses; just in case my stepmother or Leo saw me and recognized me. The Doctor was already dressed for the occasion with his leather jacket.

"I'm gonna miss them." I said, watching as Samantha kissed my brother on his dark head of hair. "Thank you for what you did." I said to the Doctor, but didn't look away from my funeral. "That money's gonna help them a lot."

"That was just a charitable donation to you family from their church." The Doctor lied. I had been there when he used his sonic screwdriver to take out all that money from the ATM.

"Is there anyway I can see if they'll be alright?" I asked and looked over at him and he looked down at me. "In the future I mean." He cocked his head back where the blue Police Box that Rose stood in the doorway of, sat behind a large oak tree, mostly out of the sight of the funeral party.

"C'mon."

\

"You can't catch me!" The little black haired girl squealed as she was chased through the large yard by brunette. We weren't super close, but we were just across the street, standing in the doorway of the TARDIS, so I was able to see that they were both the same size and had almost the exact same face. I was only able to tell them apart because one of them was dressed as Sleeping Beauty and the other was dressed as a fairy.

"Two-thousand thirty." The Doctor announced as he, Rose and I watched the girls through the open doors of the TARDIS. "April Seventh,"

"He's twenty-four now." I said as a large black SUV pulled into the driveway of the two-story suburban house. "He has kids."

"And a wife," Rose noted as a woman, maybe a few inches over five feet, with light skin and short black hair, walked around the SUV with a bag of groceries. When the blonde little girl dressed as a fairy spotted her, she forgot all about her game and ran to her. Her sister wasn't far behind.

"Mommy!" They squealed jumping at him. She barely had enough time to drop the bag and catch them before she fell to the ground with them giggling. She tickled them and played with them for a while before the front door of the house opened and a dark haired man, who I immediately knew was my brother, stepped out.

My first thought was that fatherhood suited her. Gone was the sickly little boy who used to cry because he couldn't go outside and play. In his place was a content man watching his wife and children. I wondered why he had dyed her hair darker, but then I remembered the time I accidentally dyed my hair blue and tried to play it off as if that's the color I had wanted when I was only trying to go for a lighter brown.

"Alright!" He called, clapping her hands. "Time for dinner. So get in the house you little monsters!" Leo's wige got up from the ground and picked up both little girls- which I found ridiculously impressive considering how small she was- before heading to the doorway where she gave Leo a quick kiss on the lips, inciting giggles from the girls, before going inside with Leo following after them.

"Leo and Nora Willows" The Doctor said and I looked up at him. "Right now, Nora is the mayor of Ohio and your brother is in the middle of writing his..." He thought for a moment. "Fourth book. Their daughters are Lynette and Blossom."

"He named them after me." I grinned. "How do you know all this?" I asked as he walked back into the TARDIS. Rose and I followed.

"I know lots of things and lots of people." He answered as he went to console and began pressing buttons. "Your sister-in-law becomes the youngest president in less than a decade." Way to marry up, Leo. "Young Leo becomes one of the best selling authors in the world after Agatha Christie and JK Rowling. I might just have a copy of his book somewhere in the TARDIS."

"Where are we going?" I asked as the Doctor turned back into the TARDIS and Rose went after him.

The Doctor pulled down a lever and then banged on some random piece of the console with a hammer. "To see President and First Gentleman Willows dance at her Inauguration." He suddenly stopped his movements and looked back at me. "Are you coming?"

I grinned. "Hell yeah."

"Go shut the door." I went to do as he said, but just as I got to the door, Leo, who had gone back to the car to get the forgotten groceries, looked up and when he saw me his eyes widened.

Inside, I was panicking, but I tried not to show it. Instead, I held my hand up to my lips and he stared at me in disbelief as I closed the door.

"Alright, Lynette Blossom Willows," I looked to the Doctor and Rose. "Are you ready to see the future?" I was ready to puke, to cry, to explode with happiness and the other three hundred conflicting emotions inside, but I just grinned at him.

"Bring it on," Turning back to his console, he pulled down a lever and I grabbed onto the railing as the TARDIS began shaking.

* * *

 **Next Chapter  
** The Empty Child

After stupidly following Rose, Linnie ends up stranded in 1941 and hanging from a barrage balloon. That wouldn't be too bad if it weren't for the fact that she landed on the roof of a hospital filled top to bottom with gas mask wearing patients calling out for their mummies. To add insult to injury, the TARDIS refuses to let her sleep.

 **Disclaimer**  
I do not own Doctor Who


	2. The Empty Child

_Life begins at the end of your comfort zone._

-Neale Donald Walsch

* * *

This was not supposed to happen.

The Doctor was only about to take us to the future to watch my brother, Leo, and his wife at the inauguration ball, but that's before the Doctor announced that there was an emergency.

"What is the emergency?" Rose asked and the Doctor frantically pushed buttons and pulled levers on the console and the entire TARDIS shook as it flew through space...or time...or both.

"It's mauve." The Doctor informed us and I shared a look on confusion with Rose.

"Mauve?" Rose asked.

"Universally recognized color for danger."

"What happened to red?" Rose asked and I quickly grabbed hold of the railing as the TARDIS shook violently.

"That's just humans." Rose and I both went to the Doctor who was watching the object we were following, a big metal cylindrical object, on a small screen. "By everyone else's standards, red's camp."

"But mauve, the lightest of purples, totally means danger." I mocked and grabbed onto Rose's arm as the TARDIS shook again. "Who taught you how to drive?" I asked.

"It's the object." The Doctor defended. "It's got a very basic flight computer so I've hacked in, slaved the TARDIS. Wherever it goes, we go."

"And what if it goes into a volcano?" I asked getting closer to him. "Or crashes in the prehistoric era and hits a Stegosaurus?"

The Doctor looked at me. "Are you always this positive?" I gave him a look as he moved away. "It's totally safe." As if taking that as a challenge, the TARDIS console sparked and the Doctor threw his hands up to shield his eyes while Rose and I looked away. "Okay, reasonably." He corrected. "Reasonably safe."

On the screen the object got surrounded by bluish purple hues that looked like the stuff the Daedalus, from Stargate: Atlantis, used to go through. "Doctor?" I asked, calling for his attention. "What's it doing?" The Doctor looked at the screen and his eyes widened as he pushed me out of the way. "Watch it!"

"No, no!" He groaned. "It's jumping time tracks, getting away from us." No idea what that meant, but decided it was a question for later.

"What is it?" I asked the Doctor shook his head.

"No idea." That was comforting.

"Then why are we chasing it?" Rose asked asked as the Doctor began to press keys on his board.

"It's mauve and dangerous and about thirty seconds from the center of London." He reminded us and I blew out of breath.

"And I thought these kinds of things only happened in America." I sighed shaking my head.

* * *

 **THE EMPTY CHILD**

 **After stupidly following Rose, Linnie ends up stranded in 1941 and hanging from a barrage balloon. That wouldn't be too bad if it weren't for the fact that she landed on the roof of a hospital filled top to bottom with gas mask wearing patients calling out for their mummies. To add insult to injury, the TARDIS refuses to let her sleep.**

* * *

After a very bumpy landing, the TARDIS stopped shaking the Doctor calmly walked away from the center console and to the doors. Rose followed him and I followed him.

"Do you know how long you can knock around space without having to bump into Earth?" The Doctor asked exiting the Tardis. Rose left next and I closed the door after myself.

"Five days?" Rose asked. "Or is that just when we're out of milk?" The Doctor shook his head in disbelief, meanwhile I had no idea what they were talking about.

"Of all the species in all the universe and it has to come out of a cow." I looked around and noticed that we were standing in the middle of an alleyway. There were clotheslines hanging from one building to a wall separating it from another above us and we were right next to a dumpster.

"When are we?" I asked, finding absolutely nothing that could identify the time.

"No idea." The Doctor said as we began to walk. "But that object must've come down somewhere close. Within a mile, I'd say. And it can't have been more than a few weeks ago. Maybe a month."

"We were right behind it." I reminded him.

Rose agreed with me. "She's right. How could it've dropped a month ago if we were right behind it?" The Doctor looked from her to me.

"It was jumping time tracks all over the place." He reminded us. "We're bound to be a little bit out." He looked at Rose as we went around the wall separating us from the other building's alleyway. "Do you want to drive?" He asked sarcastically.

"Yeah."

I raised my hand. "I second that." The Doctor looked down at me and I shrugged. "You need to work on your landings." And his driving. I was sure I had permanent brain damage from being thrown around so much.

"Nine hundred years I've been flying the TARDIS and the girl who's been in it twice is giving me driving advice?" I scoffed.

"The girl who's been in it twice knows how to drive everything from a Smart car to a school bus." I informed him.

"You're seventeen, when did you drive a bus?"

"I'm nineteen and things happen; some of those things just so happen to be the bus driver passing out behind the wheel when you're sixteen." I looked around again. "You said we're a little bit out. How much is a little?"

"A bit." I glowered at him.

"Is that exactly a bit?" Rose asked and the Doctor looked at her.

"-Ish."

"Your stupidly vague answers aren't helping the situation." I reminded him. "What's the plan?"

"Yeah," Rose piped in from the Doctor's other side. "You going to do a scan for alien tech or something?" Then she looked over at me. "What's a Smart car?" But I just shook my head.

"Rose, it hit the middle of London with a very loud bang." He said. "I'm going to ask." He took out what looked to be one of those credential holders the FBI use and flipped it open to show a blank piece of paper.

"It's blank." I said holding it. Who the hell did he think he was going to fool with it?

"Let me see." I went around the Doctor to stand on Rose's other side before handing it to her. "Dr. Stupid Doctor of the Idiot Doctor Society." Excuse me?

"What?!" I snatched it back, but it didn't say that. "It's a stamp card for frozen yogurt." I shook my head and looked at the Doctor. "I'm confused."

"It's psychic paper." He said taking it back. "It tells you what whatever you want it to. Can't let your mind wander when you're usin' it though." I looked over at Rose as we stopped at the end of the alley, which led to a door with a dim lamp hanging over it.

"You were thinking about frozen yogurt when we don't even know what decade we're in?" I asked giving her a disbelieving look and she shrugged. "You are unbelievable."

The Doctor put his ear to the door. "Door, music, people." He looked at us. "What do you think?"

"I think you should do a scan for alien tech." Rose said as the Doctor took out his sonic screwdriver as he knelt next to the keyhole. "Give me some Spock, for once. Would it kill you?"

I crossed my arms. "She's right." I said. "That's no fun." The Doctor looked at us and his eyes found their way to Rose's British flag T-shirt.

"Are you sure about that T-shirt?" She looked down at it.

"Too early to say." She said brushing her long blonde hair away. "I'm taking it out for a spin."

I shrugged. I was wearing a black dress with butterflies on it under a gray hoodie and a pair of gray boots. I hadn't been able to get any of my old clothes when I left home, so I made do with the ridiculous amount of clothing the Doctor had in the TARDIS. I won't tell you how many times I got lost in the span of an hour.

"Come on if you're coming." The Doctor said once the door was open. "It won't take a minute." The Doctor went inside and I went to follow him, but stopped when I noticed Rose wasn't.

"Rose." I said walking over to her and saw that she was staring up at the top of a building. "Rose." She didn't respond and I was about to call her again when she gasped.

"Doctor!" She yelled. "Doctor, there's a kid up there!" I looked up to where she was looking, but didn't see anyone.

"Rose, there's no one up th-" But stopped when I looked over at Rose, but she wasn't next to me. She had already begun running down the alley. "Rose!" I yelled, but she didn't stop. "Rose!" She had now disappeared around the wall separating me from the Tardis and I groaned. "I'm totally going to regret this."

I ran after her and when I finally spotted her, I saw that she had already run past the Tardis and up the stairs on the side of the building that would take her to the roof. "Rose!" I yelled again as I raced after here. I internally thanked my mother while running up the stairs, now grateful that she had made me try out for track and soccer.

When I got up to the roof, Rose was already in the center talking up to where a small figure stood on top of what I could only guess, from behind, was a giant metal box. A few steps closer and I realized that the small figure was a child with a something on his face.

"Mummy." He called as I stepped up next to Rose.

"Don't move!" She ordered and looked around for something that would help her climb up to the child when she spotted me. "When'd you get here?"

I lifted an eyebrow. "I was yelling your name nonstop." I reminded her. "Did you not hear me?" She shook her head and opened her mouth, most likely to update me on what was going on, but stopped when she saw something swinging in front of us and caught it. It was a rope.

"I've got to get him." She said looking up to where the boy stood. She went to climb up the rope, but I stopped her.

"Let me go first." I said grabbing the rope. "I've had to climb a rope every week at school. The gym teacher said it'd help me later in life." I looked at Rose. "I never believed her." With a deep breath, I grabbed the rope with both hands before putting myself up it. I was able to keep it steady and wrapped the end of the rope around my foot when I got high enough. It wasn't until Rose began climbing up after me that I realized it might've been a bad idea.

"Mummy." The boy called again and I yelped when suddenly the rope was pulled away from the box the boy was on. "Balloon." The boy said and I looked up to see that the rope hadn't been connected to the box, at all, but to a large gray barrage balloon in the sky. Alarms began to sound and I screwed my eyes shut.

"You have got to be kidding me!" Of course we would've landed during the London air raids.

Rose screamed as the balloon began flying us away from the box and away from the building. I, regrettably, looked down to see that the nearest thing to land on was the ground which was about a two hundred foot drop.

"Rose, don't look down!" I ordered and my eyes shit in annoyance when I heard her scream. "I said _don't_ look down!"

"Of course I'm gonna look down when you tell me not to!" Rose yelled. "Have you seen any movie ever?"

"Do not yell at me!" I yelled back. "You're the one who didn't check what the rope was connected to!"

"And you're the one who climbed up it!" She screamed and I looked down at her. I noticed that that ground was getting further and further away. Rose looked up and her eyes furrowed. "Are you wearing Spongebob knickers?"

"Really Rose?" I demanded. "We're hundreds of feet in the air, dangling from a barrage balloon in the middle of an air raid and you're asking me about my underwear?!"

"Just trying to lighten the mood." I glared at her.

"We are dangling in the middle of the air!" I reminded her and with once look down she remembered and screwed her eyes shut.

"This is bad!" Rose yelled as if I didn't already know and I took a deep breath. "This is really, really bad!"

"Maybe this isn't the best time to be wearing a patriotic flag." I joked and she glared at me.

"Really?" I shrugged as best I could.

"Just trying to lighten the mood." I mocked, but screamed when I heard a bomb go off fairly close to us.

After ten more minutes of rope burn and bombs going off underneath us, Rose and I were pretty exhausted, scared and I was a few minutes from pissing myself.

"Ah!" Rose screamed as a plane flew right underneath us. I looked down and saw that she had slid down even further down the rope.

"Hold on, Rose!" I yelled.

"I'll never let go!" I couldn't help the bark of laughter that left my mouth.

"We're back to the jokes?" I asked, but we were brought back to reality when a plane came straight at us. Luckily, neither Rose or I were hit, the the edge of its wing did hit the rope above me and the rope swung violently. Rose screamed as she slid down further down the rope and I knew it wouldn't be long before she fell.

With my foot still wrapped around the rope, I managed to slide down the rope slowly, but with another scream, Rose let go of the rope. I was one step ahead of her.

I slid all the way down and quickly grabbed her hand. "I got you!" She clutched onto my arm with her other hand as I tried to ignore the my rope burned hand. "Try and wrap your arms around my waist." I instructed, feeling my hand and thighs slip down the rope. Rose did as I said and once her arms were around my waist I took hold of the rope with both hands.

"We're gonna die." Rose whimpered and looked down at her.

"No!" I said and she looked up at me. "We are not going to die! Not here, not now! Not before I see my baby brother dance with his wife. You understand?!" She nodded and I did too, happy that she had believed me. "Good."

 _'Why did I lie to her?'_ I thought. _'There is literally no scenario in which we get out of this alive.'_ Eventually my hands would cramp up and I would have to let go of the rope. Hopefully we'd find a roof to land on first. I remembered what the Doctor had told me when I woke up in the hospital; I couldn't die while my brothers life force was inside of my body, but he didn't say I couldn't get hurt.

Rose and I both screamed when a bomb went off maybe ten or twenty feet away from us and Rose let go of my waist, but I was prepared for that. I released my foot from where it was wrapped around the rope and quickly wrapped my legs around Rose's upper body, under her arms. We were both uncomfortable, but she was alive.

The triumphant feeling didn't last for long though. My hands began slipping and both Rose and I noticed it. "You have to let me go!" I shook my head. "If you don't, we're both gonna fall!"

"I'm not going to kill you!" I grunted as I tried to wrap the rope around my forearm, I was going to have a very serious case of rope burn later.

"Let me go!" Rose yelled.

"No!" I yelled back. Rose didn't appreciate that answer because she began to wiggle, trying to get out of my grasp. "Stop!" I yelled, but she didn't. "Rose, stop trying to kill yourself!" I ordered and she looked up at me.

"I'm not tryin' to kill myself." She said. "I'm trying to save you."

"That's not fair!" I reminded her. "I'm not going to let you go! I'm not going to let you die!"

Rose shook her head. "You don't have a choice." She said and took the small window of opportunity she had before pinching my inner thigh. I yelled in pain and my legs instinctively unwrapped themselves.

Rose screamed as she fell through the air and I looked up so I wouldn't have to watch her fall, but, suddenly, she stopped screaming. Looking back down, I let out a gasp when I saw that she was floating in mid-air, having been caught by some strange- most likely alien- beam.

"Rose?!" I called to her, but my attention was diverted back to the rope that I was holding onto for dear life when an explosion nearby pushed the balloon further away- not to mention the ringing that was sounding in my ears.

Another hour of hanging from a barrage balloon rope left my hands cramped and were thoroughly rope burned by how many times I had to pull myself back up when I started to slip. Thankfully, by the time the barrage balloon neared a building high enough for me to land on, the air raid was over.

As soon as I lowered myself to the end of the rope and took the ten foot drop that landed me on the roof, I began crying. I tried to tell myself that Rose was okay- that she had been caught and saved by the strange beam, but it didn't stop me from crying. Maybe it was shock.

After wiping away my tears, I took a deep breath before looking around for the door to take me to the top floor of whatever building I was in. Once I found it, I went down the stairwell and somehow immediately knew I was in a hospital, most likely an abandoned one. Not many places used a combination of tile floors and florescent lights and had numbered rooms. The only other place like that I could think of was a school.

I hated the fact that it was a hospital. Scary movies took places and hospitals and the lone sound of thick wooden heel of my boots clicking on the floor only made me more scared and paranoid. I was too much of a baby to look into any rooms so I just kept walking until I found a stairwell an followed it all the way down to the first floor before I heard voices.

"Hello?!" A voice called, but I didn't recognize it. It was a man, most likely someone who worked here. There had to be someone keeping the lights on.

I decided against calling back, but the thought was out of my mind as soon as I heard a second voice. A female one that I knew very well. "Hello?!" I sprinted down the rest of the steps and through the doors separating the stairwell from the first floor. When I got into the hallway I saw the back of Rose and a guy who was definitely not the Doctor as they walked down the hall.

"Rose?" She whirled around, as did the guy, and a grin went over her face when she saw me.

"Linnie." I ran to her and she didn't protest when I threw my arms around her. "Miss me?"

"I thought you got abducted by aliens!" I practically yelled as I squeezed her to death before I remembered what she did. I quickly pushed her away from me before slapping her across the face as hard as I could. The man winced and stepped away as Rose held her cheek. "What the hell is wrong with you?!" I demanded. "You made me drop you! I thought you got kidnapped by some weird green alien-"

"No offense taken," The man said.

"Did you even think about what would happen if I returned to the Doctor and had to tell him that you let yourself drop from a barrage balloon so that I could live?!" I shook my head as I pulled her into a hug. "I hate you so much right now."

"First of all," Rose began when I pulled back. "Ow!" I was unapologetic. "Second of all; I didn't die. Jack caught me." I turned to the guy she had been walking with and he held his hand out of me.

"Captain Jack Harkness." He introduced flirtatiously when I took it. I had to admit that he was kind of handsome; black hair that was parted to the side, square jaw and dimples that went deep into his face. He wore a long gray jacket and what I could only guess was a British government uniform.

"Linnie." I introduced. "So what?" I asked crossing my arms. "You were just taking a stroll through a German air raid in and caught a girl who fell from a thousand feet in the air with your magic alien light beam?"

"I'm an ex-Time Agent." He said. "Now I'm just a freelancer. I saw Rose falling and couldn't resist saving such a beautiful damsel in distress" I quirked an eyebrow before looking back to Rose. I opened my mouth, but didn't get a chance to ask anything because suddenly the doors at the end of the hall opened and the Doctor came walking towards us. I expected Jack knew who he was because he pushed right past me before taking the Doctor's hand. "Good evening." He said. "Hope we're not interrupting."

"This is Jack Harkness." I introduced.

"I've been hearing all about you on the way over." The Doctor looked over at me an I pointed to Rose.

"He knows." She said quickly and the Doctor looked confused. I was too. "I had to tell him about us being Time Agents." The Doctor nodded, but I was confused. What the hell was a Time Agent? It had been said twice now and yet no one felt the need to explain- although, I guess asking would probably tip Jack off that we weren't actually Time Agents.

"It's a real pleasure to meet you Mr. Spock." Jack said slapping the Doctor on the back before walking past him. I resisted the urge to snort.

"Mr. Spock?" The Doctor asked quizzically.

"What was I supposed to say?" She asked. "You don't have a name. Don't you ever get tired of Doctor?" She asked. "Doctor who?"

"Nine centuries in, I'm coping." He said.

"We could call him Doctor Who." I suggested. "I think that'll catch on."

"Where were you two?" The Doctor asked looking between us, but his eyes landed on Rose's face. "Why is your cheek red?" I crossed my arms and turned to face Rose.

"Yeah, Rose." I said with narrowed eyes. "Tell him why your face is red." I'm pretty sure he'd be more pissed at her for letting go than at me for hitting her for letting go.

Rose seemed to think that too."Never mind that." She said and began walking after Jack. The Doctor and I followed. "What's a Chula warship?"

The Doctor stopped, but Rose and I didn't. We went through the doors the Doctor had exited through and saw two rows of bed, one against each wall. They were all filled with people in gas masks. Some where under the blankets, but others weren't.

"This just isn't possible." Jack said after he was finished scanning one with the bang on his wrist. I had decided as soon as I came into the room not to go near any of them. "How did this happen?"

"What kind of Chula ship landed here?" The Doctor asked with crossed arms.

"What?" Jack asked.

"He said it was a warship." Rose filled in. "He stole it, parked it somewhere out there. Somewhere a bomb's gonna fall on it. Unless we make him an offer." He sounded more like a con man rather than a freelancer.

"What kind of warship?" The Doctor asked as Jack walked around the room.

"Does it matter?" Jack asked. "It had nothing to do with this."

I raised my hand a bit. "If TV has taught me anything, it's that everything matters. Don't you think it's strange that an alien warship crashes in the middle of London and then a bunch of people start getting sick or..." I waved my hand at them. "Whatever this is?"

"She's right." The Doctor said walking toward Jack. I went to stand next to Rose. She linked her arm with mine so I assumed that I was forgiven for slapping her. "This started at the bomb site. It's got everything to do with it. What kind of warship?"

"An ambulance." Jack confessed before stepping closer to the Doctor and pressing a few buttons on his wrist band thing. Rose and I got closer so we could see. "Look," He said as a hologram of the cylinder thing we had followed lifted from his band. "This is what you chased through the time vortex. It's space junk, I just wanted to kid you it was valuable." He admitted lowering his wrist. "It's empty. I'm sure of it, nothing but a shell."

"How do you know that?" Rose asked with a shake of her head.

"Because I threw it at you." Jack replied. "Saw your time travel vehicle- love the retro look by the way, nice panels-"

" So not the time." I reminded him as I looked around at the people in the beds. They were giving me a bad feeling

"I threw you the bait-"

"Bait?" Rose asked.

"I wanted to sell it to you." Jack continued. "Then destroy it before you found out it was junk."

"You said it was a warship." I reminded him and he gave me a slightly condescending look.

"They have ambulances in wars." He said slowly as if I were four and walked a few feet past us. "It's a con." He admitted as we turned around to face him and he turned around to face us. "I was conning you. That's what I am, I'm a con man. I thought you were Time Agents. You're not, are you?"

"Nope." I said popping the P. "Just three more freelancers." I finished in the same condescending tone he had used on me.

"Oh! Should've know." He said. "The way you guys were blending in with the local color. I mean, flag girl was bad enough, but U-boat Captain?" He looked at me. "But I hear it in your voice. You're not from around here are you?"

"America." I replied. "From about...seventy...seventy-seven years in the future?" I looked at the Doctor who nodded.

Jack shook his head. "Anyway," He said. "Whatever's happening here has got nothing to do with that ship."

"What _is_ happening here, Doctor?" Rose asked looking around at the people in the beds.

He looked at her. "Human DNA is being rewritten...by an idiot."

"What do you mean?" I asked. "Are you talking about the gas masks?"

He nodded. "It's some kind of virus." He explained. "It's converting humans into these things."

"Why would anyone want to do that?" I asked with a shrug. "What would be the point?"

The Doctor shook his head. "I have no idea." He confessed before going to look at one of the patients. Jack and Rose did the same, but I just sat on the edge of the small desk in the center of the room. The last thing I wanted was to be near one of those things when they popped up and I knew they would. They always did. That didn't stop me from jumping in fright when they did.

"What's happenin'?" Rose asked jumping away from the patient she had been near when he, along with all the others, sat up. They all began calling out 'Mummy'.

"I don't know." The Doctor admitted as the patients began getting out of bed. _'Great,'_ I thought. _'Now they're walking.'_

"Does anyone else think we should be running?" I asked, but I was once again ignored.

"Don't let them touch you." The Doctor warned as the patients began advancing and began backing us against the wall. I was absolutely certain that we were gonna die.

"What happens if they do?" Rose asked.

"I'm assuming whatever happened to them." I said. They all continued to call for their mummies as they advanced on us and I felt Rose lace her fingers with mine as Jack and the Doctor stood in front of us.

Yep...we were absolutely about to die...again.

* * *

 **Next Chapter:**  
The Doctor Dances

Linnie, Jack, Rose and the Doctor must find a way to get themselves out of their current mess; surrounded by infected patients who want their mummies. What happens when they all finally come face to face with Patient Zero? What secrets is Nancy, a girl who makes it her mission to care for the street children of London, hiding? And why is Linnie suddenly not feeling so hot? And why the hell won't the TARDIS let her sleep?


	3. The Doctor Dances

This was the fourth time in a matter of days that I had been a hundred percent sure I was about to die. Unlike the last time, I wasn't able to save myself, but that didn't mean somebody else couldn't.

Even as the patients advanced, the Doctor stepped forward. "Go to your room." He ordered and I furrowed my eyebrows as I watched him. Was he insane? I guess he wasn't because they all stopped where they stood. "Go to you room." He repeated and every single patient cocked their head to the side as they stared at him. "I mean it," He said. "I am very, very angry with you. I'm very, very cross." When they didn't move, the Doctor tried again. "Go. To. Your. Room!" He pointed to the left.

At first I was certain that the patients were going to bum rush him, but instead they all began to slowly turn and head back to their respective beds before getting back into them. Once they were all back into bed, the Doctor let out a breath.

"I'm really glad that worked." He said. "Those would've been terrible last words." I looked at him in disbelief. He saw my look. "What?

* * *

 **THE DOCTOR DANCES**

Linnie, Jack, Rose and the Doctor must find a way to get them out of their current mess; surrounded by infected patients who want their mummies. What happens when they all finally come face to face with Patient Zero? What secrets is Nancy, a girl who makes it her mission to care for the street children of London, hiding? And why is Linnie suddenly not feeling too hot? And why the hell won't the TARDIS let her sleep?

* * *

"Why are they all wearing gas masks?" Rose asked from where she kneeled next to one of the patients in bed. She obviously hadn't learnt her lesson the first time. I, on the other hand, had and was once again seated on the desk in the middle of the room while Jack sat in the chair.

"They're not." He answered. "Those masks are skin and bone."

"That's disgusting." I commented.

"How was you're con supposed to work?" The Doctor asked and Jack looked over to him as he put his feet up onto the desk next to me.

"Simple enough, really." He said and I pushed his feet back onto the floor. "Find some harmless piece of space junk, let the nearest Time Agent track it back to Earth, convince him it's valuable an name a price. When he's put fifty percent upfront...oops!" Jack held his hands out. "German bomb falls on it, destroys it forever. He never gets to see what he's paid for, never knows he's been had. I buy him a drink with his own money and we discuss dumb luck. The perfect self-cleaning con."

I scoffed. "Because it totally went according to plan." I said gesturing at the gas mask wearing patients.

Jack ignored me, I was really getting tired of people ignoring me as if I wasn't here. "The London Blitz is great for self-cleaners. Pompeii's nice if you want to make a vacation of it, though. But you've got to set your alarm for Volcano Day." He laughed. Nobody else did.

"That's not funny." I said and Jack's laughter died down.

"I'm assuming you disapprove?" He said looking at me and then the Doctor.

"Look around the room." The Doctor ordered. "This is what your piece of harmless space junk did."

"It was a burnt-out medical transporter." Jack defended. "It was empty."

I scoffed again. "Obviously it wasn't." I said as the Doctor turned and headed towards the door.

"Rose, Linnie." He called and I looked at Rose.

"Are we getting out of here?" Rose asked and I crossed my fingers.

"We're going upstairs." My fingers were now uncrossed and I was up and following Rose and the Doctor.

"I programmed the flight computer so it wouldn't hit anything living." Jack called after us. "I harmed no one!" Rose stopped and looked back at Jack so I did too. If you hadn't noticed, I was taking most of my cues from her and the Doctor. "I don't know what happening here, but believe me, I had nothing to do with it." He claimed.

"I'll tell you what's happening." Apparently the Doctor had stopped too. "You forgot to set your alarm clock. It's Volcano Day." Suddenly the sound of a siren sounded, but it wasn't close.

"What's that?" Rose asked.

"The all clear." I answered, remembering my fifth grade history test. "Means the air raid is over...for now." Then I took Rose's hand before pulling her after the Doctor. I could hear the sound of Jack's footsteps following us, but as we went up the stairs, I lost sight of the Doctor. His legs were a lot longer than mine.

"Mr. Spock?!" Jack asked as he, Rose and I rushed down the hall.

"Doctor?" Rose and I chorused.

"Have you got a blaster?" We heard from behind us and we all skidded to a stop before turning back and running to the stairwell where the Doctor was already on the second flight of stairs.

"Sure." Jack said and reached into his pocket as he rushed up the stairs. I pushed Rose after him as the Doctor ran out of sight to the top floor. I hadn't stopped to explore when I was up there the first time, but I still managed to follow the Doctor as he ran down halls.

He finally stopped in front of a thick metal door at the end of a hall. "The night your space junk fell, someone was hurt." He said looking to Jack. "This is where they were taken."

"What happened?" I asked.

"Let's find out." The Doctor stepped to the side of the door and looked at Jack. "Get it open." Jack grinned and pulled out a small, alien looking gun and Rose pulled the Doctor to the side. Jack pulled the trigger on his gun and a square beam shot out and made a square hole where the lock and handle had been. "Sonic blaster." The Doctor said as the door swung open. "Fifty-first century. Weapon factories of Villengard."

"You've been to the factories?" Jack asked.

"Once." The Doctor said taking the gun and examining it.

"They're gone now." Jax explained. "Destroyed. Main reactor went critical, vaporized the lot."

The Doctor held out Jack's gun to him. "Like I said; once." He looked back at Rose. "There's a banana grove there now. I like bananas." He turned to Jack with a big smile on his face. "Bananas are good."

He went into the room and I rolled my eyes. "That was random, but true." I said walking past Jack and going in after him. We ended up going into a small room, but it was too dark to see anything. The Doctor obviously didn't mind before he was just walking around in the dark so I flipped the switch.

The room had been trashed. The room we were in looked like an observation room with sound equipment that had been destroyed for the most part, except for what I thought twas a recorded. The glass looking into the observation room had been shattered.

I went into the second room to look around. There were dozens, maybe fifty or sixty, child drawn pictures of women, one on each page and each was different. They were all stick figures, but some had red hair, blue hair, green bodies, the list went on. There were even more pictures on the floor along with the odd toy, a knocked over chair and a bed that had been shoved into the corner. There were even more drawings that had been drawn directly on the wall.

"What do you think?" I heard the Doctor ask.

"Something got out of here." Jack replied and there was silence. I figured someone was waiting for elaboration.

I was right. "Yeah, and?" The Doctor asked, but I couldn't see what they were doing. I was too busy staring at the pictures. It's like the were radiating some kind of energy that I couldn't place.

"Something powerful..." Jack added. "Angry."

I sighed. "And sad." I added and I could feel them all staring at me. I heard footsteps come into the room and they were light, too light for Jack or the Doctor, so it had to be Rose. I confirmed that when she stepped beside me.

"Are you okay?" She asked and I shook my head.

"That little boy." I said. "The one we saw on the roof?" She nodded. "This was his room."

She furrowed her eyebrows. "How do you know?" I had no idea how I know.

"I just do." I replied. "He kept calling for his mom, like...like he didn't know where she was, like he wanted her, but these-" I knelt down for a moment before picking up one of the drawings. It was of a stick woman with a red body and blue hair. She had a smile on her face. "This is...he didn't just not know where she was..." I looked at Rose. "He didn't know who she was or what she looked like. That's why there's so many different drawings." I looked around the room.

"You think the thing that's doing this is a child?" Jack's voice asked from behind me and I turned my head to look at him.

"The person." I corrected. "The person who did this was a child and he's not a child anymore because of your stupid Chula space crap!" Jack looked down and I knew he was feeling bad even though he claimed he had nothing to do with it, but I wasn't feeling to bad about making him feel that way.

"How could a child do all this?" Rose asked.

" _Do you know where you are?_ " A voice asked. It was old and male, but it was coming from right behind us. We all turned around to see that the Doctor had flipped the switch on the recording device.

" _Are you my mummy?_ " Another voice asked. It was the little boy Rose and I had gotten stuck on a barrage balloon for.

" _Are you aware of what's around you?_ " The older voice asked, ignoring the boy's question. " _Can you...see?_ "

" _Are you my mummy?_ " The boy asked again.

" _What do you want?_ " The first voice asked. " _Do you know-_ "

" _I want my mummy!_ " The boy yelled. " _Are you my mummy? I want my mummy! Are you my mummy? Mummy? Mummy?_ "

"Please turn it off." I requested, turning away from the broken observation window.

"Doctor," Rose said. "I've heard this voice before."

"Me, too." He confirmed.

"Always 'Are you my mummy?'." She said. "Linnie's right, I don't think he knows who his mum is."

"Why doesn't he know?" Jack asked. I shook my head.

"He's probably an orphan." I told them as I sat the knocked over chair upright and sat on it. "Parents probably died or abandoned him."

"No." The Doctor said rushing into the room. "Can't you sense it?" The Doctor asked. Rose looked at me, Jack and then the pacing Doctor.

"Sense what?" The Doctor shook his head again.

"It's coming out of the walls." He said. "Can't you feel it?" He suddenly stopped and looked at me and Rose, who was standing next to me while I sat in the chair. "Funny little human brains. How do you get around in those things?"

"Excuse me?" I asked and Rose put an hand on my shoulder.

"It's okay." She said. "He likes to insult other species when he's stressed." Well that's his problem, not mine."

"Rose, I'm thinking!" The Doctor defended, but I figured he just needed her quiet.

"Mummy?"

"He cuts himself shaving, does half an hour on life forms he's cleverer than." Rose added looking to Jack as the Doctor continued pacing around the room.

"Are you my mummy?" The Doctor stopped suddenly when he was next to me.

"There are these children," He said. "Living rough 'round the bomb sites. They come out during air raids, looking for food."

"Mummy, please."

"Why aren't they in an orphanage?" I asked, but the Doctor shook his head.

"Suppose they were there when this thing, whatever it was, landed."

"It was a med-ship." Jack stepped in. "It was harmless."

"You keep saying that," I said. "Harmless. It obviously was not harmless."

"What if one of the children was affected," The Doctor took over. "Altered."

Jack crossed his arms. "Altered how?"

"I'm here!" That's a new one.

The Doctor didn't notice. "It's afraid." He said. "Like Linnie said. It's terribly afraid and powerful. I doesn't know it yet, but it will do."

"Mummy?" That was it.

I turned to look up at the Doctor. "I thought I asked you to turn that thing off?!" I demanded and he snickered. "This isn't the time for jokes! Why are you laughing?"

"I did turn it off." I he said and I furrowed my eyebrows. "That child has the power of a God and I just sent him to his room."

"I'm here!" The voice said. "Can't you see me?"

I looked around at the bed and drawings on the wall as I realized what the Doctor was saying. "This is his room." The Doctor whirled around and I stood up to see the child standing in the observation room, gas mask and all.

It was just staring at us. "Are you my mummy?" He asked and cocked his head to the side. "Mummy?"

"Is this a normal occurrence?" I asked looking over at the Doctor and then back at Rose. "About to die or be...altered?"

"Pretty much, yeah." She nodded and I turned back to the child.

"Fantastic."

Thankfully one of us had a plan." On my signal make for the door." Jack ordered before whipping out his gun- wait what? "Now!"

"Is that a banana?" I asked staring at the yellow fruit he was pointing at the child. Jack looked at the banana and the Doctor grinned at him before pulling out Jack's real gun and pointing at the wall. A large square portion of the wall disappeared and the Doctor yelled: "Go, now, don't drop the banana!"

"Why not?" Jack asked and the Doctor rushed us toward the hole. Rose went out first, then me and then Jack.

"Good source of potassium." The Doctor said jumping out of the hole and right into us. He righted himself before Jack took his gun back and used it to refill the hole in the wall as the child walked toward it.

"Nice!" I breathed and he looked smug.

"Digital rewind." He explained before looking to the Doctor. Rose looked like she was freaking out a bit so I went to make she she was okay.

"Are you alright?" I asked putting my hand on her back and she nodded.

"Just wasn't expectin' that." I nodded and rubbed her back.

"I don't think any of us were." The rest period, however, was short lived.

Suddenly we all heard a loud crack and looked to see that someone, the Child, was punching the wall from the inside.

"Doctor!" I yelled.

"Come on!" The Doctor began running and we all followed him around the bend of the hall, but we all skidded to a stop when a hoard of patients came through the doors leading to the other portion of the hall.

"Back, back, back!" I yelled and we all turned around and ran back around the bend only to stop when the patients began walking out of their rooms, all of them calling out for their mothers. We tried to go back the other way, but stopped when the patients came around the bend and then pushed ourselves back against the wall when the child continued to try and break out. "He's herding us." I realized.

"It's controlling them?" Jack asked pointing his gun at everything and anything.

"It is them!" The Doctor said. "It's every living thing in this hospital."

I shook my head. "All I'm hearing it crap we already seem to know. Does anyone have a plan?"

Jack went back to pointing his gun towards the oncoming group of patients. "This can function as a sonic blaster, a sonic cannon and it's a triple-enfolded sonic disruptor. Spock, what've you got?"

The Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver. "I've got a sonic...never mind." He quickly shoved it back into his pocket as Jack turned back to us.

"What?" Jack asked.

"It's sonic, okay?" The Doctor said. "Let's leave it at that."

"Would somebody please do something!" I asked. I seemed to be the only one who noticed the look on Rose's face. She was thinking of something.

"Disruptor? Cannon? What?" Jack asked as the child punched the wall again. We were gonners.

"It's sonic, totally sonic." The Doctor rushed. Is he really embarrassed? "I am soniced up!"

"A sonic what?!" Jack yelled and the Doctor had enough.

"Screwdriver!" He yelled right in my ear and I flinched. Jack turned to face us with a look of disbelief on his face. The child had now broken through the wall and I turned to Rose.

"Whatever you were thinking about, do it now!" I ordered. She grabbed Jack's gun and pointed it down at the ground.

"Going down!" She yelled before pulling the trigger. The floor disappeared and I screamed as we fell down to the lower floor. Jack took the gun back and replaced the floor.

Unfortunately for me, I landed on my back while Jack, Rose and the Doctor managed to land on their feet. "Lynette, are you okay?" I held my hands out and the Doctor took them before pulling me up. Did he just call me Lynette?

"Surprisingly, yes." I answered before looking to Rose. "What took you so long?" I asked and she scoffed.

"The gratitude."

I narrowed my eyes at her. "Bite me." Jack seemed to still be on the sonic screwdriver thing.

"Who has a sonic screwdriver?" He demanded sounding miffed.

"I do." Rose rolled her eyes and turned to me.

"Find some lights." I nodded and she went to one end of the room while I went to another. The Doctor and Jack stayed where they were, arguing. I couldn't see much so I just put my hands on the wall and ran them across until I hit something.

"Got them!" I announced and pulled the switch up.

"Mummy!" I jumped away when I realized that we were in yet another room full of infected patients and they were all waking up. "Mummy! Mummy! Mummy!" They overlapped and I rushed back to the middle of the room to Jack and the Doctor. Rose did the same.

"Okay," I said. "So maybe turning on the lights wasn't the best idea."

"Door." Jack said and took off towards it, expecting us to follow. Unfortunately the door was locked and Jack's gun was no longer working.

"Damn it!" Jack hit his gun against the palm of his hand and I looked to see the patients getting closer. They were taking their time, but I wasn't complaining.

"I don't mean to rush you, but they're getting closer." I informed him as he moved away from the door and was replaced with the Doctor who took out his sonic screwdriver.

"It's the special features." He said. "They really drain the battery." Thankfully the Doctor got the door open.

"The battery?" Rose demanded. This was so not the time. I grabbed her by the arm on her jacket and pulled her inside of the room. Jack followed and the Doctor closed the doors and sealed them with his screwdriver. "That's so lame."

"Well, I was gonna send for a new one," Jack said turning on the lights and going to the window. "But someone had to go and blow up the factory."

Rose blew out a breath. "I know. First day I met him, he blew up my job. That's practically how he communicates."

"Not the time!" I shouted and they both shut up. I took a deep breath and pulled out out the band keeping my braid from falling apart before retying my hair into a messy bun. I was suddenly feeling very hot.

I looked around, but had no idea where we were. The room was unusually large for a closet, but there was a few shelves holding medical supplied like wraps of gauze and bottles of stuff. There were a few packages in piles on the floor, a wheelchair and a few other pieces of hospital furniture.

"That door should hold for a bit." The Doctor said moving away the door.

"The door?" Jack demanded. "The wall didn't stop it!"

"It's got to find us first!" The Doctor yelled back. "Come on, we're not done yet. Assets."

I unbuttoned the top three buttons of my dress and pulled it open. Why was I so hot? "I've got a banana and in a pinch you could put up some shelves."

"Window?" I asked, hoping someone would open it as I fanned myself. Was I getting sick?

"Barred, sheer drop." Jack said. "Seven stories." That's just great.

"And no other exits." Rose added in. Jack sat down in the wheelchair and I sat down on the door and let my head drop between my knees. What was the matter with me?

"Well, the assets conversation went by in a flash, didn't it?" Jack asked.

"Not helping." I grunted.

"So where'd you pick this one up, then?" The Doctor asked.

"Doctor, don't be rude." I ordered before shaking my head. Why did I care?

"She was hanging from a barrage balloon, I had an invisible spaceship." Jack said and I lifted my head. "I never stood a chance." The Doctor looked at me.

"How did you get here?"

I shrugged and wiped the sweat on my forehead. "Rose forced me to let her go and the balloon brought me here. I dropped ten feet to the roof, cried, made my way to the first floor, found Rose with Jack, slapped here for making me let go and then you showed up."

The Doctor looked at Rose who wouldn't meet his eye. "We'll talk about that later. Right now we've got other things to deal with. One; We have to get out of here. Two; We can't get out of here. Have I missed anything?"

I looked to Jack, expecting him to say something, but was confused when I saw that he was no longer in the wheelchair. I looked around, but he was nowhere to be seen.

"Yeah," I said. "Jack's gone."

"What?!" Rose and the Doctor turned to look at the empty wheelchair. "What do you mean he's gone?" Rose demanded and I sighed.

"We'll, he was there a few seconds ago and now he's not." I elaborated. "Gone."

The Doctor squinted his eyes at me as he jumped down from the podium by the window and made his way to me. "Lynette, are you okay?"

I nodded. "Yeah," I lied. "Just a little hot." He took out his sonic screwdriver and shined it on my forehead before looking at the side.

"More than hot." He said. "Your temperature's in the triple digits. I don't want to scare you or anything, but the first number isn't a one." Rose crossed her arms and I let my eyes closed.

"It works as a thermometer?" She asked before everything went dark.

/

"Linnie?" Rose knelt down in front of Margo and placed her hands on the sides of the girls face. "Linnie? are you okay?" The Doctor knelt down next to Rose and felt the brunette's forehead. "What's wrong with her?"

The Doctor shook his head. "I'm guessing her brother had the flu."

Rose looked up at him. "Had?" He nodded.

"Her physical body had the symptoms and now it's been passed on to her life force's host body." He explained. "She'll be fine. She just needs some sleep and fluids. Here," Rose moved out of the way and the Doctor slid one of his arms behind Linnie's back and the other underneath her legs before picking her up and putting her in the wheelchair.

"She'll be alright though, right?" Rose asked and the Doctor nodded.

"Her body will burn through it pretty quickly." He answered. "Now we just have to wait."

And wait is what they did.

For twenty minutes all they did was wait. The Doctor took it upon himself to check Linnie's temperature every five minutes and was satisfied that it was lowered by a couple of degrees every time.

"Rose?" Jack's voice said and the two looked around, looking for him. "Doctor? Linda? Can you hear me?" The Doctor quickly got up from where he sat as static sounded and rushed over to the radio that sat on one of the shelves. It was backwards so he turned it around and began to tune it so Jack's voice came out clearer.

"Her name is Linnie." Rose corrected. "Where are you?"

"I'm back on my ship." He answered. "I used the emergency teleport. Sorry, but I couldn't take you. It's security-keyed to my molecular structure. I'm working on it so hang in there."

"How are you speaking to us?" The Doctor asked.

"On-Com." Jack answered. " I can call anything with a speaker grill."

"The child can do that too." The Doctor said.

"He can?" Jack and Rose chorused, sounding surprised. Rose was surprised that the Doctor hadn't mentioned it earlier.

The Doctor nodded. "Anything with a speaker grill. Even the Tardis phone."

"You mean the child can phone us?"

"I can hear you." The child's voice said from the speaker, answering Rose's question. "Coming to find you...coming to find you." He sang.

"Doctor, can you hear that?" Jack asked.

"Loud and clear."

"I'll try to block out the signal. It's the least I can do."

"Coming to find you, Mummy." The child called.

"Remember this one, Rose?" Jack asked before Moonlight Serenade began to play. The Doctor looked at Rose quizzically, wondering why she would even know the old song.

She blushed. "Our song." She said before moving away to check on Linnie.

/

When I woke up, I was alone.

No Rose. No Doctor. No Jack. "Those asshole." I breathed closing my eyes. "Those asses left me."

"We didn't leave you." A voice said and I opened my eyes to see the Doctor was right in front of me. I furrowed my eyebrows. He was not there a few minutes ago. "See?" He said gesturing to himself. "I'm still here." I put my hands on the armrests of the wheelchair I was in, I decided to worry about how I got in it later. I tried to lift myself up, but only ended up pushing the wheelchair back. "Whoa!" The Doctor rushed forward and caught me before I hit the floor. "I don't think you're strong enough to do that yet." He moved one of his hands before my back before sliding the other one under my legs.

"I don't need to be carried." I protested, but that didn't stop me from laying my head on his shoulder.

"I don't believe that." The Doctor argued.

"I second that." I picked up my head and turned it a bit to see that we were no longer in the hospital closet, but in a ship. It kind of looked like a puddle jumper from Stargate: Atlantis just more...colorful. Rose stood a few feet away and Jack was sitting in pilots chair.

"How're you doin', champ?" I opened my mouth to reply but nothing came out. "Yes, I have that effect on most women- men too."

"What happened?" I asked looking back to the Doctor.

"You got sick and took a nap." He said simply. "Your brother got sick and when he got over it, the sickness moved to your body because of his life force."

"Life force?" Jack asked.

"Long story." I heard Rose say back.

"Your body burned through it pretty quick." The Doctor said sounding a bit amazed. He turned so he was facing Jack and Rose. I heard a beeping sound and Jack turned his chair back around to face the front of the ship, that's when I realized that the Doctor was still holding me.

"We're good to go." He said and the Doctor let me down.

"Where?"

"The bomb site where the Chula warship landed." Rose told me and I could feel the ship moving. "But I think you should stay here."

"Why?" I asked and she gestured at me.

"You're sick." She reminded me. "You can barely stand."

I gave her a look. "She's right." I looked up at the Doctor who shrugged. "You should stay here, get some rest."

"I'm fine." I argued. They both looked at each other and I knew I wasn't going to win this. "Fine." I sighed. "I'll stay on the stupid ship."

Of course, I didn't do that.

As soon as Jack had beamed Rose, the Doctor, and himself from the ship I got into the pilots seat and watched them walk away under a bridge near the bomb sight. I had seen the buttons Jack had pushed so I just pushed them myself.

I ended up just where the others had and made my way under the bridge and too the gate. I had no idea where to go from there so I just walked along the fence until I spotted Jack, the Doctor and Rose. They were in the middle of the gated area, near the train tracks, all standing around a metal cylinder thing that I was pretty sure had been the thing we were looking for and it was beeping for some reason. Luckily for me there was a hole not far away in the gate.

I forced myself through and ended up making some noise...that how everyone spotted me.

"I thought I told you to stay in the ship?" The Doctor asked when I made my way to them.

"You did." I confirmed. "And I didn't." I finally got tot hem and realized there were four people, not three. The extra person was a girl who looked like she was a few years younger than me with dark brown hair, brown eyes and red cheeks. I held up my hand. "Hi, I'm Linnie."

"Nancy." I nodded and turned back to the others. "So," I said clapping my hands together. "Are you going to waste time and drag me back to the ship or are we going to open then this?" Then I noticed they had already opened it. "Never mind..." I leaned closer. "Why is it blinking red?"

"Jack opened it and now it's calling the gas mask people to come and kill us." Rose answered. Oh, we're going to die? How refreshing.

Suddenly the big red doors leading outside the gate began moving, like people were pressing on them. "I'm assuming they're here."

"Captain, secure those gates." The Doctor ordered. Jack looked like he wanted to argue, but just shook his head and started running. The Doctor looked at me. "How did you get in here?"

I pointed my thumb behind me. "Somebody cut the gate open."

"That was me." The brunette, Nancy, claimed and the Doctor looked to her.

"Show Rose." He said before taking out his sonic screwdriver and tossing it to Rose, who just nearly caught it. "Setting 2428-D."

"What?"

"Reattaches barbed wire." That was oddly specific. "Go!" Rose ran off with Nancy and I turned to the Doctor.

"What do you want me to do?" I asked as the Doctor began trying to stop the beeping coming from the Chula ship. He turned back and looked me up and down before answering.

"Try not to faint again." I huffed and put my hands on my hips.

The Doctor continued to fiddle with the ship, but wasn't able to stop the beeping before Jack, Rose and Nancy returned. The movement of the gate began going faster as Jack pushed open the small door of the ship.

"See?" He asked standing up straight and looked to the Doctor. I leaned to look inside, but there was nothing there. "It's empty. Look at it."

"What do you expect in a Chula medical transporter? Bandages? Cough drops? " The Doctor asked sounding extra condescending. It didn't suit him. "Rose?"

Rose shook her head. "I don't know."

"Yes, you do." He corrected and held up his hand and rotated it. What did that mean?

"Nanogenes!" I crossed my arms and turned to the blonde.

"What in the hell is a nanogene?" I asked and she stepped toward me and away from Nancy.

"Jack's ship was filled with 'em." She told me. "Little...lights that surround you and fix you up."

The Doctor looked back to Jack. "It wasn't empty, Captain." He said. "There was enough nanogenes in there to rebuild a species." He crossed his arms as an understanding look went over Jack's face.

"Oh, God..."

"Gettin' it now, are we?" I looked to him.

"Now is not the time to be a condescending ass!" I informed him. "How could little, healing lights make the child what he is?" I asked.

"When the ship crashed the nanogenes escaped." He began. "Billions upon billions of them. Ready to fix all the cuts and bruises in the whole world, but what they find first is a dead child. Probably killed that night and wearing a gas mask."

"And they brought him back to life?" Rose asked with a disbelieving tone in her voice. By the look on Nancy's face, she couldn't believe it either. "They can do that?"

"What's life?" The Doctor asked rhetorically. "Life's easy. A quirk of matter. Nature's way of keeping meat fresh. Nothing to a nanogene."

"That's why they've all got gas masks, right?" I asked as I filled in the rest of the blanks. "They didn't know what a human was supposed to look like, so they just assume our faces look like gas masks because that's what the kid looked like." The Doctor pointed to me, telling me I was correct and I shook my head. "How did I know that?"

"You've basically got two brains in your head because of your brothers life force." He said. I felt like I was going to hear those words a lot; 'Your brother's life force'. "The extra brain soaks up the information and knowledge the first brain misses or can't. Makes it easier to understand."

"That doesn't explain why everyone else's faces are turning into masks." Rose said.

"The nanogenes think they know what a human should look like." The Doctor explain. "So now it's time to fix all the rest. And they won't ever stop. They won't ever, ever stop. The entire human race is gonna be torn down and rebuilt in the form of one terrified child looking for his mother and nothing in the world can stop it!"

"I didn't know!" Jack yelled and I looked back at Nancy, realizing that it was her brother we were talking about. Her brother was part of the cause for everything going on. She had an uncomfortable look on her face and I understood.

"Nancy," I called softly and she looked up at me. "Where is your mom?"

Nancy shifted on her feet. "She died when I was-" She shook her head. "I mean, when Jamie was smaller. Our dad too."

I shook my head. "She die in childbirth?" I asked and Nancy shook her head. If her mother hadn't died in childbirth, why didn't Jamie know what she looked like? She opened her mouth to continue, but it slowly closed as her eyes drifted away from my face and over my shoulder. I followed her line of sight to see that she was staring at trains a long way down the track.

"I think someone's out there." She said as I moved away from her. I walked a few feet forward and squinted my eyes, trying to see what it was.

"Doctor!" I yelled, backing up when I saw that it was a hoard of patients coming straight at us. As if we hadn't had enough of them at the hospital.

"Mummy!" I heard them call as they slowly got closer. "Mummy!"

The Doctor popped up from behind the Chula ship, but his eyes looked down before he addressed me. "The ship thinks it's under attack." He said. "It's calling up the troops. Standard protocol."

I saw Rose's lips move, but I couldn't make out what she was saying. She and the Doctor exchanged a few sentences before he stood up. I just made out the words 'Chula warriors'.

"Mummy!" Nancy and I whipped around, now finding that there were dozens more patients all around the fence. The child was herding us again.

"Why aren't they attacking?" Jack asked moving down from the raised ground around the ship.

I looked at him. "Let's not complain."

"They're waiting for their commander." The Doctor replied.

"The child?" Nancy looked to Jack.

"Jamie." She corrected. "The child has a name and it's Jamie."

"Mummy? Mummy?"

"Jack, did you say a bomb was going to fall here?" I asked and Jack nodded. "When?"

"Any second." He said, looking and sounding terrified, but he hid it well.

Seriously? I whirled my hands in a 'keep going' gesture. "Could you be a bit more specific?"

"I wish."

The Doctor stepped down from the raised dirt before making his way to Nancy and I. "What's the matter, Captain?" He asked. "Bit too close to the volcano to you?"

"He's just a little boy." Nancy said, close to tears and I put my hand on her shoulder.

"I know, sweetie."

She shook her head. "He's just a little boy who wants his mummy."

"I know." The Doctor said looking out at the patients. "There isn't a little boy born who wouldn't tear the world apart to save his mummy."

I looked at him. "What are we gonna do?" I asked. "His mom is dead." I looked to Nancy who wiped at her face, trying to hid her tears. "Sorry."

"It's my fault." She said and I shook my head.

"Do not blame yourself." I told her. "You've done the best you could to raise him after your parents..." I stopped when Nancy ducked her head, most likely to keep her tears at bay. "Your parents..." I repeated as I realized what she meant. "Not Jami-"

"Mummy?" That hadn't come from one of the patients. That was the child's voice. "Mummy?" The patients began repeating after the child's voice and began to overlap. "Mummy? Mummy? Mummy?" I turned back to Nancy to see that she was now open crying, making to attempt, whatsoever, to hide her tears.

"Oh, no."

"What?" Rose asked from where she stood by the ship, but I ignored her. Let them see how annoying it was to be ignored. "What's going on?"

"How old are you, Nancy?" I asked softly as she cried. The patients continued to call out for their mothers, but Nancy didn't answer me. "Fifteen? Sixteen?" I asked. "Or are you older than you look?" I felt the ground shake as my ears were assaulted by the sound of an exploding bomb, but I didn't take my eyes off of Nancy. "I once knew a woman who was thirty and looked like she was teenager."

"Doctor, the bomb." Jack warned as another exploded. It was a lot closer that time. "We've got seconds."

I didn't hear the Doctor's reply as I stared at Nancy. "What year is it?" I asked her. "1940? 1941?" She sniffed and I took that as a yes.

"Lynette, what are you going on about?" I heard the Doctor ask.

"When I was a freshman in high school, my school took a survey." I began, not looking away from Nancy. "There were two hundred and eighty five girls in my school and forty-three of them were pregnant." I told them and Nancy let out a sob as I turned my head to look at the Doctor. "More than half of those girls weren't even fifteen yet." I turned back to Nancy. "I live in 2018 and being a pregnant teenager then is one of the worst things that could happen to someone. You were a pregnant teenager in the 1930's." I shook my head. "I can't even imagine."

"I-I told 'im our parents were dead when he started asking questions." She cried and shook her head.

"He knew the truth, though." I continued and she nodded. "Somehow, even after all the lies you told him, he knew the truth. That's why he keeps asking if you are his mother."

We all turned our heads when the gate that Jack secured was pushed open and even more patients entered the railroad tracks. All of them being led by the child, Jamie.

"Are you my mummy?" He asked. I looked back to Nancy who squeezed her eyes shut.

"He's going to keep asking." I told her, but she already knew that. "He's never going to stop asking until he gets an answer." She opened her eyes and I looked to see that Jamie was getting closer, but the other patients had stayed where they were. "You have to tell him."

"I can't." Nancy said with a sniff.

"You have to." I countered.

"Nancy," The Doctor said and she looked over my head at him. "The future of the human race is in your hands." Nancy looked away and back at Jamie. "Do what Lynette says and tell 'em."

"Are you my mummy?" Nancy began to walk forward and met the tiny boy halfway. "Are you my mummy?"

"Yes." Nancy said quietly. "I am your mummy."

"Mummy?"

"I'm here." I felt Rose take one of my hands as Jamie got even closer to Nancy.

"Are you my mummy?"

"Yes." Nancy knelt down on the ground so she was face to face with Jamie and took his hands.

"Are you my mummy?"

I shook my head. "I don't think he understands." I said. "He might be too far gone."

Nancy was not willing to give up. "I am your mummy." She told him. "I will always be your mummy...I'm so sorry." She pulled him into a hug and I stepped back as they were surrounded in tiny golden lights that began buzzing around them.

"What's happening?" I asked, but no one answered me. "Doctor?"

"Shh!" He balled up his hands. "Come on! Please!" He urged staring at the lights. "Come on, you clever little nanogenes. Figure it out." I looked to Rose, but she didn't know what was going on either. "The mother, she's the mother."

I gasped, suddenly realizing what he was begging for and Rose looked at me expectantly.

"What?" She asked, wanting to know.

"The nanogenes." I told her. "They brought him back to life, they made him this way because they didn't know what a human was supposed to look like."

Rose didn't get it. "Yeah, so?"

"So?" I scoffed. "If they're smart enough to bring Jamie back to life, they're smart enough to realize that if Jamie's mother looks like she does-"

"Than he should look the same!" She realized. I was rubbing off on her.

The nanogenes scattered away and Nancy fell back onto the ground, but Jamie didn't move. The Doctor ran forward with Rose and I on his heels and stopped right beside the small child.

"C'mon." The Doctor pleaded. "Give me a day like this. Give me this one." He took hold of the mouth piece of the mask before pulling it up. We all basically freaked out when it slid clean off and behind it was the place of a small, grinning blonde child. "Ha ha!" The Doctor yelled before grabbing Jamie and tossing him into the air. I covered my mouth as Rose hugged me from the side. What even...? "Welcome back!" The Doctor greeted. "Twenty years to pop music." He said. "You're gonna love it."

He returned Jamie back to the ground where he was pulled into another hug by, a now standing, Nancy.

"What happened?" She asked.

"The nanogenes recognized the superior information." The Doctor explained although that really didn't tell us anything. "The parent DNA. They didn't change you because you changed them!"

Another explosion went off somewhere far away, slightly dampening the good mood, but the Doctor didn't seem bothered by it. "Doctor, the bomb." Rose warned, but he just kept on grinning.

"Taken care of it." He answered and I narrowed my eyes.

"How?"

He threw his hands up. "Psychology."

I looked up to see a large bomb heading straight towards us with a high pitched whistle, but before it could could the ground, Jack's ship came out of nowhere and engulfed the bomb in a line of blue rings.

"Hey, Spock!" I looked up and was surprised and shocked to see that Jack had beamed himself on top of the bomb. Two questions ran through my head; how was he so calm with a bomb, seconds from exploding, between his legs? And how was he gonna get back up?

"Good lad!" The Doctor called up.

"The bomb's already started detonation." Jack called down. "I've put it in stasis, but it won't last."

"Then why the hell are you still here?" I demanded? "Go put it on Mars or something!"

"I think I'll miss you most of all, scarecrow."

I furrowed my eyebrows. We were in 1940. "That movie isn't even old enough to be refrenced yet!" I reminded him as he, the bomb, and the blue rings disappeared but came back a second later.

"By the way!" He called and we all looked up. "Love the T-shirt." I looked over at Rose's T-shirt, now on full display and raised an eyebrow as she grinned.

"What?" She demanded as the ship flew away. "I can't enjoy a compliment?" I raised my hands in surrender, but put them down when I noticed the Doctor walking away from us and toward the patients. He, however, stopped when he was about ten feet away from us.

A cloud of nanogenes formed around each one of the Doctor's half raised hands as he admired them. "Doctor!?" Rose called. "What're you doing?"

"Software patch." He said and I rolled my eyes.

"We're not the IT guys," I reminded him, putting a hand on my hip. "Just tell us what you're doing." The Doctor looked back at us and grinned.

"I'm gonna email the upgrade." He explained before turning back. "You want moves, Rose? I'll give you moves." The Doctor pulled his hands back before throwing them out at the patients and the nanogenes followed. They flew through the air and formed a cloud over the patients before they all fell to the ground, unconscious. "Everybody lives, girls." He said as the patients, no longer covered in gas masks, began to rise from the ground. "Just this once! Everybody lives!"

The Doctor ran to them and I turned to Rose with a grin. "I think this is a Kodak moment." I said before kneeling down and pulling out my phone from where I had tucked it into my sock. I had almost forgotten it was in there.

"Is that your phone?" Rose asked and I nodded. "So they basically get flatter and bigger as time goes on?"

I nodded. "Pretty much." I quickly typed in my four digit code to unlock my phone before clicking on the camera app and flipping it around so I showed myself. "Everybody squish in!"

"What is that?" Nancy asked picking up Jamie as I tried to get us all in the frame.

"Don't worry about it." I told her. "By the time these things come out, you'll either be in diapers or dead. Now say cheese!"

/

"That was a very exhausting day." I commented from where I leaned against the center console.

We were now back in the TARDIS, on our way to get Jack. After leaving Nancy and Jamie we had gone straight back to the alley where we left it and got in. Then the Doctor decided he was feeling charitable and was going to save Jack from 'the volcano'. I had already stopped trying to understand him.

"You do not even get to complain." Rose said from where she sat on the small two seater. "You got to take a nap!"

I gaped at her. "I was sick and my body was burning hotter than humanely possible." I reminded her before looking over at the Doctor. "What was my temperature?"

He thought for a moment. "269"

I looked back at Rose. "See? 26- wait, what?!" I demanded standing up straight and he looked confused as to why I was yelling.

"What's wrong?"

"I was burning up at 269 degrees, that's what's wrong!" I yelled. "You didn't think to get me Tylenol o-or some antibiotics?"

The Doctor shrugged. "You're fine aren't you?" I scoffed and shook my head.

"You're unbelievable." Rose laughed as I sat down next to her. We were both quiet for a few moments as we watched the Doctor tinker with a wooden brown box he had on the other side of the TARDIS. I didn't know what it was, but it was keeping him quiet.

"I'm sorry." Rose said suddenly and I looked over at her with an raised eyebrow. "About your mum and brother." She elaborated. "I don't know what I'd do if I couldn't see my mum ever again."

"It's fine." I told her. "After seeing my brother and how well he did with me gone..." I shook my head with a sigh. "I'm sad because I didn't get to see him grow up, but I'm proud of him, y'know?...I'm proud that he did something great with his life. He's a writer, he's married to the president of America!" I looked over at Rose. "He saw me, you know." I told her. "When we went to 2029. He looked so confused, so sad and so..." I struggled to find the word. I gave up after a moment had passed. "I can't even begin to understand how he felt."

"He was probably happy." Rose said. "I mean, imagine it; You're a kid when your big sister dies and then you suddenly see her again thirteen years later and she doesn't even look a day older than the last time you saw her." Rose laughed. "I'd pee my pants, but I'd still hug you and never let you go."

"Do you have any brothers or sisters?" I asked and she shook her head.

"My dad died when I was a baby." She answered. "My mum never remarried." I raised my hand and put it over the hand she had sitting on her knee.

"Then I'll be your sister." I told her. "I've always wanted a sister. I mean, Leo was great and I'll never be able to get over not seeing him grow up, but I also need someone my own age. I spent all my time working so I didn't really have any friends."

"I..." Rose dragged out. "Would love for you to be my sister, my best friend, my confidante..." She trailed off in a silly deep voice and we both laughed when I pushed her slightly.

A few minutes later, I found out what the Doctor had been fiddling with when it began playing an old song from the fifties...or forties. Apparently the Doctor and Rose had some unfinished business, because she instantly got up and started giving him dancing lesson. They were actually quite entertaining to watch, especially when the Doctor dropped Rose on her butt.

"Lynette," The Doctor called as he helped Rose up from where she had tripped over his feet. "Would you go invite our guest in?"

I shrugged. "I don't know what that means, but sure." I quickly pulled myself up before jumping over the railing and going over to the TARDIS doors. I pushed them open, expecting to find myself in eighteenth century France or something, but instead found myself staring into Captain Jack's ship. He sat in the pilots chair with a martini glass in his hand.

"Thanks for everything, computer." He thanked and raised his glass. "It's been great." And with that he lowered his glass to his lips. I knew that was the perfect time to invite him on board.

"This is the saddest pity party I've ever seen." I said and grinned when Jack choked on his drink and began sputtering as he turned to me. I leaned against the TARDIS doorway as he stared at me in disbelief. "Are you coming or would you rather stay here with the detonating bomb?"

Jack quickly jumped out of his seat before rushing out of his ship and into the TARDIS. Once he was in, I closed the door after him. Rose and the Doctor were still trying to dance when I took the spot next to Jack and snorted when Rose nearly fell when the Doctor tried to dip her.

"Okay," She said moving away from him. "Try and spin me again, but this time, don't get my arm up my back. No extra points for a half-Nelson."

The Doctor scratched his head as he went toward the radio. "I'm sure I used to know this stuff." I put my hands behind my back and cleared my throat, hoping to get the Doctor's attention. He looked over at me and I cocked my head towards Jack. "Welcome to the TARDIS."

Jack looked around at the beams and high ceiling. "Much bigger on the inside." I bumped him with my hip.

"You'll get used to it." I told him and turned back to the Doctor when the sound of jaunty dancing music began playing.

"Rose! I've just remembered!" The Doctor grinned.

"What?" The Doctor began snapping his fingers and began crossing one leg over the other as he stepped towards her. For some reason I was reminded of when the drama department in my school put on their version of West Side Story during my Senior year.

"I can dance!" He chanted swinging his arms as he snapped his fingers. "I can dance!" The Doctor took Rose and began dancing with her around the TARDIS' center console. Feeling awkward just standing there, I turned to Jack and held out my hands.

"Captain?" He took my hands with a grin before we went up the steps and began dancing. We couldn't do all the fancy spins and dips Rose and the Doctor could and I'm pretty sure I stepped on Jack's feet more than once, but he never complained. He simply tried to keep his feet away from mine as we made up our own little dance.

"I'm going to spin you now!" I quickly shook my head, but Jack grinned as he nodded.

"Jack-" I warned, but I was cut off when he pulled me in close before pushing me out. He did that two more times before he spun me and let go of my hands.

"Ooph!

"Ow!"

Apparently the Doctor had the same exact idea as Jack and had spun his dancing partner too...right into me. Rose and I had managed to spin without tripping over our own feet, only to hit my forehead on Rose's when we collided and fell onto our butts.

"Are you okay?" I smacked Jack's hands away a couple of times as I tried to get up on my own, but he was persistent so I let him help me before helping Rose up too. I could already see a bruise starting to form on her forehead.

She rubbed the spot she bumped with a groan. "I think that's gonna leave a bruise."

"It is." I told her. I remembered when I had run into a girl on the playground when I was a little girl. It wasn't a giant bruise, but it did hurt. I turned to Jack. "And this is why we don't spin girls who can't dance."

Rose and I went to sit in the seat that sat facing the console while the Doctor began banging on it like usual. Jack's hands went to his hips. "What are you doing?"

"Oh, this is how he works his spaceship." I told my fellow American. "He presses buttons and bangs things with a hammer."

Rose nodded. "Very alien." She grinned before looking over at the Doctor. "Where are you taking us anyway?" She asked.

"Well," The Doctor said, not stopping his pulling, pressing and banging. "I figured you all could use a break after everything that happened with Nancy and the gas mask people, so I am taking you to our original destitnation." He pulled on a lever causing the TARDIS to make a crash landing and I fell onto the ground. Eventually, I was going to end up with a bruised tailbone. It was only a matter of when.

"Maybe we should postpone that trip, Doctor." Rose suggested as I pulled myself up from the floor. "I'm spent."

"And I'm sore," I added. "I don't think your machine likes me and I'm starting to feel the same way about it." The Doctor considered this.

"A few hours won't hurt." He agreed.

/

Since I was the new girl, it was unamously decided that I should be the one to show Jack to one of the many, infinite spare rooms. I, obviously, didn't get a vote because If I did I would already be in my room. I mean, seriously, who decides that the news, most inexperienced person in the TARDIS should show new people around? Insane people, that's who.

After making sure Jack was situated, I managed to find myself back to my own room. It was insane how easily the Doctor had been able to recreate my bedroom from back home. It wasn't much- just a full sized bed, a desk, dresser and closet with a couple of photos and posters on the walls- but it was familiar. The Doctor had insisted that it had been simple enough as making any other room, but I really appreciated it. I had also appreciated the adjoining bathroom.

After taking a shower, I changed into a pair of pajama pants with a cloud pattern and a gray tank top before climbing into my bed and falling asleep.

Unfortunately, I didn't sleep for long; A shrill buzzing noise woke me up from my sleep, but it didn't cause me to actually get up and try and do something about it until it got louder.

Throwing my covers side, I stood up from the bed and slipped on my penguin shaped slippers before venturing out of my room.

The buzzing was still loud as I made my way down the hall and I honestly couldn't believe that I was the first to hear it. Maybe this was a nightly thing and Rose and the Doctor were used to it, but how did that explain Jack? Was I going crazy or was he just the heaviest sleeper to ever exist?

I continued to ponder those thoughts as I- unintentionally- made my way to the control room. It wasn't until I stepped up to the console that I realized that the loud buzzing noise had stopped. I couldn't help but think that the TARDIS had lured me here. I decided to test that theory.

"Alright," I said looking up at it. "I'm here. You called, I answered- now what do you want?" I got nothing in response. Of course I got nothing- what was I expecting? It was a machine. Turning around, I started back towards the hall, only for the buzzing to return and even louder this time. "Okay!" I yelled, returning to the console. "Okay! I'm back! What the hell do you want?" The buzzing got louder. "Okay! I'm sorry! I'm sorry, geez." The buzzing quieted down. "Don't be so sensitive." The TARDIS made a strange humming noise. "Yeah, I don't know what you're saying; I don't speak TARDIS." It hummed again. "Use your words," I suggested. "You've got a screen; tell me what you want." I went around to the screen just as words began to pop up.

 **I WANT YOU GONE**

"Why?" I demanded immediately. "What did I do?"

 **I DON'T KNOW YOU**

"You can't get to know me if you try and put me out." I pointed out. "Plus, there was a time you didn't know Rose- or even the Doctor and I don't see Jack up here in his underoos waiting to get kicked out.

 **...**

"That's what I thought," I sighed. "Why don't we get to know each other?" I suggested. "Maybe then you'll be a bit more comfortable with me being here because, honestly, I have nowhere else to go." It said nothing. "What do you think?"

TALK. START FROM THE BEGINNING

"The beginning?" I asked before sighing and leaning on the console. Okay, the beginning; I was born on April 11th in Japan- Sendai to be more accurate...

* * *

 **Next Chapter  
** The Glass

After a horrible time in 1941, the Doctor decides it's time for a bit of relaxation for all of them, but of course he can't go anywhere without causing trouble. And what happens when Linnie and Rose find an underwater city prepping to take over the planet?

* * *

 **Okay, so I did add some Linnie/TARDIS bonding in this chapter mostly because I hate how- in some stories- OC's are in the TARDIS and magically have some super tight bond with the TARDIS that they put no effort into. I wanted Linnie and the TARDIS to get to know each other the same way everyone else does; by actually talking.**


	4. The Glass

"Okay," The Doctor began, clapping his hands together as he looked over us all. As soon as we had landed in Space Florida- actually, it was called Blellela, but the Rose and I had refused to call it that, instead opting for Space Florida- we had all gotten out of the formal wear that we had worn to my sister-in-law's inauguration and changed into something more appropriate for the beach- well, most of us did. The doctor refused to get out of his black leather. "We are on the island known as Blellela. Normally I'd let you all go on your merry ways, but a little background first."

Rose groaned and crossed her arms. "Are we going to stay in the TARDIS the whole time we're here, or...?"

"Just let me finish." The Doctor ordered and Rose just rolled her eyes before motioning for him to continue. "Thank you," He said mockingly. "Now, Blellela-"

"Space Florida." I slipped in, but quickly closed my mouth when the Doctor glared at me. He crossed his arms, waiting for me to say something else, but I zipped my lips shut. Staying quiet was a small price to pay for a vacation to an alien planet.

"As I was saying," The Doctor restarted. "Blellela is mostly a tourist planet and they get aliens from as close as Noveormore and from as far as Cachitilly, so try not to offend anyone- Rose, I'm talking to you. Blellela has two suns, so it's only dark for about three hours every day. Also, they've got these annoying little creatures here called Garbs. They're about the size of an eyeball, but it only takes six hours for their poison to kill you so if you get bit-"

"Go to a real doctor?" I suggested and the Doctor gave me a look.

"Yes, go to a doctor." He repeated. "Now, I've already given you all money so the only other thing I ask of you before I send you on your way is-" And the Doctor looked directly at Rose and I. "Do not get arrested. The penalty for almost every crime is death."

I couldn't help it when my eyes popped open. Was he serious? Or was this one of his little mind game Rose had warned her about to force them to keep themselves out of trouble. "Death?"I asked and the Doctor nodded.

"Yup."

"Like, death death?" Rose asked and the Doctor nodded again.

"Death." He confirmed. "Now have fun." He said before turning and leaving out of the front doors of the TARDIS. Jack left not a second later, leaving me and Rose standing in front of the open doors of the TARDIS.

"Death penalty." I nodded, trying not to let on how much that had rattled me. "Well, I can't die, so I'm good." Rose gaped at me as I walked to the doors of the TARDIS.

"Well some of us aren't immortal for the next hundred years!" She yelled.

* * *

 **THE GLASS**

After a horrible time in 1947, the Doctor decides it's time for a bit of relaxation for all of them, but of course he can't go anywhere without causing trouble, but how was he supposed to know that Linnie and Rose wound unknowingly start a war between an underwater city and the planet above?

* * *

"Aren't these just lovely?" Rose asked as she admired a pair of small earrings. They were a light pink and in a weird shape, but- if I had to guess- I'd say they were made out of some sort of shells.

"How much for these?" I asked pointing the the earrings at the merchant turned to face us. He looked down at what I was pointing to before a friendly smile went over his face.

"The Beshire shells?" I nodded, but I had no idea if that's what they actually were. "Two copper." Thankfully, their currency system wasn't that hard to learn. It was actually pretty simply; there were twenty-two copper pieces in a silver shilling, thirty-five silver shillings in a gold coin and fifty gold coins in a platinum chip. The only thing that usually went wrong was either Rose or me confusing a shilling for a chip considering they looked just about the same. We had concerned a lot of friendly merchants when we overpaid severely for a few things and managed to piss off a few who thought we were trying to rip them off.

Taking the right amount of money and handing it to the merchant, I picked up the box the shell earrings sat in and gave it to Rose. We had been in the markets, shopping since we left the TARDIS, but I wasn't complaining. I had loved shopping back when I was with my family, but I was never able to buy the clothes I wanted since most of my money went towards bills. All of my clothes usually came from thrift stores, but I tried not to complain, especially now that I could wear whatever I wanted; between the clothes Rose offered to share with me and the giant room of clothes the Doctor had in the TARDIS, my options weren't exactly limited.

Today I had decided to try something different and put on a blue and gold tribal print bikini and a pair of cutoff shorts I had made from a pair of Rose's jeans. She hadn't exactly been happy, but- to be fair- I hadn't known they were hers; she had left them lying on the floor of the minimall the Doctor called his closet.

"They'll make a great gift for my mum." Rose commented as she closed the small box and slipped it into her bag. We started off through the strip of vendors and merchants once again.

"When was the last time you saw her?" I asked. "Your mom?"

"It's been a few weeks." She admitted. "But I call her all the time. She's got a new boyfriend or whatever, so I don't feel so bad about leaving her alone." Suddenly, I wondered how long it had been since my stepmother had seen me last; I knew it had only been a few weeks since I saw her last, but time was hard to keep up with while I was travelling with Rose and the Doctor. It could have been months- years, even, since Samantha found out that I 'died'.

Rose looked at me and she seemed to suddenly remember that I wouldn't be able to see my family again. "I'm sorry." She apologized immediately. "You can't even see your mum again and here I am acting like I haven't seen mine in ages." I shook my head.

"It's okay." I assured her. "Just because my life has turned into a massive puddle of crap and aliens doesn't mean that everyone else has to stop living theirs. I just..."

"Just what?"

I sighed. "I just wonder about her and Leo." I admitted. "Whether or not I did the right thing by making them believe I was dead. I mean, when I was in college I was going to major in psychology, so I've read tons of articles on how traumatizing it could be for kid to lose someone at such a young age; Leo already lost my dad and then he lost me too."

"Don't go blamin' yourself for that." Rose instructed. "You did what you thought was right. Plus, it's not as if you can't pop in on them now and then. We do have a time machine." I completely forgot about that.

"You're right." I nodded.

"Plus, you've already seen Leo." She reminded. "He's doing great; he married the president of America and he's got two little girls."

"You're right." I admitted once again. "Everything I did, I did for Leo and he turned out just fine. Now it's time to focus on me; I mean, look at me!" I scoffed. "I'm in the future, on another planet, and all I can do is worry about someone who's fine."

"You just need to loosen up." Rose nodded. "Now c'mon; we've got a vacation to make the best of."

/

Rose and I went down to the beach where most of the tourist seemed to be; I knew they were tourist because everyone I had met so far who lived on the planet looked like humans- other than their pointed ears and ridiculously large eyes. I saw people with blue skin, tails, horns- just about anything you could think of. It was probably just the artist in me, but I found them all beautiful in their own ways.

Anyway, Rose and I settled down on a set of beach chairs while we people watched- well, Rose people watched. I spent ten minutes putting on sunblock so I wouldn't burn; I had needed to apply it multiple times during my shifts at the Shack and that was for a world with just one sun. This one had two and the last thing I needed was getting cancer from some alien sun.

"So," Rose began, looking to me as I lathered my leg with lotion. "Tell me about 2018." she requested. "What's it like?"

"Well..." I didn't know exactly what to tell her. "William and Kate are pregnant again; Kylie Jenner gave birth after hiding her pregnancy for nine months. Disney channel sucks now, Mariah Carey is trying to be a reality star and she's failing hard; the president used to be a black guy that just about everyone loved, but he got replaced by Donald Trump, so everyone's moving to Canada. No one can get over Black Panther, Supernatural has taken over Tumblr and no one respects anyone else's culture anymore. Eating Tide Pods is a thing, Gilmore Girls got a Netflix reboot, they killed off Wolverine and Deadpool got another movie after the first one dominated at the box office."

Rose stared at me for a few moments without saying a thing and I was actually worried that I broke her brain. "Yeah, I didn't get anything after Disney Channel." I snorted and shook my head.

"Well, in simplest terms; America is such a wreck that even the starving children in Africa feel bad for us."

"It sounds mad." I nodded as I laid back in my chair.

"And it's also your future." I pointed out. "No to mention, my present, but seeing as we've gone to the future and the world didn't end, I have to believe that everything got better."

"It always gets better," Rose assured me before she suddenly shot up from her chair. "Let's go swimming!" She requested as she tried to pull me towards the water. She had shed her oversized tee and shorts, leaving her in her two piece bathing suit. Luckily, she was also smaller than me, so I managed to dig my heels into the sand to stop her from pulling.

"I don't want to get wet," I complained and she gave me a look.

"Once way or another, you're getting wet." I tried to hold back my snort of laughter, but I couldn't. Rose looked at me like I was inside.

"It's nothing," I laughed. "You'll understand in ten years." She huffed before taking off towards the water with me in tow and, this time, I didn't stop her.

The ocean water was incredibly blue and you could see almost everything underwater. Despite the fact that I didn't want to stray too far away from the shoreline, I ended up following Rose bout forty feet out. The water was about twenty or so feet deep at that point so Rose and I dived down a couple of times. She, however, couldn't make it the entire way, but I had been on the swimming team in middle school. I could hold my breath for three minutes and seventeen seconds, so Rose insisted that I dived down to collect whatever shining, glittering or misshapen seashells caught her eyes. I only got small ones since the only place Rose had to store them was her bikini.

Huh? You want to know if I put any in mine? The answer is yes, because Rose was very persuasive and I had a soft spot for her ever since she tried to die for me by letting go of that barrage balloon.

"My mum is going to love these." Rose said, stuffing another seashell in her bikini bottom. She had about seven all together, but I only had three or four. The last thing I wanted was for a seashell to slip into a place where no seashell should ever go. "Maybe we can ask the doctor if we can go back to 2030. You could leave them as a gift for your brother- he won't even have to know it was you."

"I have a feeling that he'll know it was." I admitted as I pushed wet hair out of my face. "I mean, imagine seeing your nineteen year old sister, thirteen years after she's died. Then you get a box full of weird seashells. Who would you think it was?"

Rose nodded. "You have a-" But she didn't get to finish her sentence.

With a gasp, Rose was pulled under the water and, before I was even able to start freaking out, I was too.

A slender, scaly hand wrapped around the ankle of my right foot and I was pulled under the water, but I was able to take a deep breath before I was submerged. I immediately began trying to swim back up to the surface, but the grip on my leg was too tight. When I realized this, I looked down to see that it was a woman who had grabbed hold of me; I didn't focus on her though, instead I kicked at her with my free leg as she continued to to pull me down. it didn't help much.

I had already been down for a minute and a half when the scaly woman began pulling me sideways away from shore at an alarming speed and ahead of us was Rose being pulled by a similar looking creature/person, but I could see that she was already unconscious. She would be dead soon enough if I didn't so something.

Folding my right leg, I brought myself closer to the scaly woman and I kicked at her again, this time nailing her right in the back of the head, but it was like she didn't even feel it.

I did, however, know that she noticed it. How? Because she took me further down and swung my body so my head made impact on a large rock. Pain erupted in my head, but I was out a second later.

/

When I woke up, I immediately began coughing up the water and was pushed on my side so the rest could come out. My brain was pounding against my skull and my throat felt like sandpaper. Drowning sucked.

"Are you alright?" A melodic voice asked and I I tilted my head to the side to see a woman knelt down next to me- a scaly woman.

I scrambled away from her as fast as possible as my heart began to speed up and she held her hands up as if I was a rabid animal ready to attack.

"Calm down." She said gently. "I'm not gonna hurt you."

"Well, excuse me if I don't believe you." I replied with a cough. "I just got drowned."

"I'm sorry for that." She apologized. "Sallah got carried away." Sallah? That's when I noticed that this woman was not the only scaly person around.

I was in a large, castle-like room and there were about six other scaly people/creatures standing around; two stood guarding a set of large, wooden double doors and held long spears, there was the one talking to me, one not far away from us glaring at me with her unnaturally blue eyes and two more that stood at another set of double doors with spears the same as the others. Where the hell was I? Where the hell was Rose?

"Where am I?" I demanded. "Who are you? Where's my friend?"

The woman was more than happy to answer my questions. Despite the fact that they were all covered in scales and skin, they all looked differently; the woman in front of me only had scales covering her shoulders, her neck and legs, and it varied how covered she was. The scales on her neck were scattered around lightly while the ones on her legs fully covered her and the colors reminded me of a rainbow fish. She had unnaturally long light brown hair and pale green eyes. The woman behind her was fully covered in multicolored scales from head to toe and only half of her head produced the black hair that feel down to her shoulders. She had been the one who drowned me and the fact that the one talking to me hadn't been the the one to do so, was the only reason I hadn't attacked her- well, that and I had no idea how strong she was. Last thing I needed was a broken neck.

"You're in Chalaan." She told me. "My name is Srie Sonnse; my father rules this country and this is Sallah." She looked back to the one who drowned me. "Your friends name is the Rose flower?" I didn't know what that meant, but I nodded. "She awoke moments before you. She is with my father and mother. I can take you to her."

I tried to stand up on my own, but I almost collapsed onto the floor, my legs were so wobbly. I had no choice but to let Srie help me.

I was right; were were in a castle and a very big castle at that. There were painting of all different sizes and styles, sculptures, cases- anything you could dream off. The ceilings held large, beautiful and intricate chandeliers and lighting fixtures and the walls were made out of dark brown wood and gold, but the main attraction had to be the window.

Srie had led me into a long hallway with Sallah following closely, but I had been too busy to notice the window because I was too busy noticing everything else. It wasn't until we got to the end of the hall that I saw the window.

It was huge and wide with nothing to obstruct the view of outside. There was nothing special about the window itself, but what it looked out too.

"We're underwater." I breathed as I watched the numerous fish and sea creatures that swam past the window, near and far. In the distance, I was even sure that I saw some sort of prehistoric whale. "We're underwater."

I felt a presence approach behind me. "Welcome to the underwater city of Chalaan."

/

"Thank god, you're okay." I sighed as Rose pulled me into a hug. "We have been in way too many life or death situations together."

Srie took me straight to Rose after I was done gawking at the ocean.

Rose was in a large throne room with dozens of scaly people, but a few of them were guards. I suddenly wondered what they were supposed to be. With the scales and the being able to breath underwater thing, my mind was screaming mermaids, but I wasn't going to assume...yet. Plus, they all had legs and wore clothes- or, what passed as clothes, I guessed. It was mostly netting and shells.

"It was all a misunderstanding." Rose told me. I was honestly feeling just a bit exposed, standing around in my bathing suit, but Rose's was smaller than mine. "Saith and Naal were explaining everything to me 'fore you came in."

"Explaining what?" I asked. "And who are Saith and Naal?"

"We are." Turning my head, I saw two of the scaly people standing a couple of meters away from us in front of two, matching golden thrones. Much like everyone else, they differed in appearance.

The first was taller than most of the other scaly people-I should really ask what their species is called- and I could tell that he was a man; his dark gray scales covered his entire body up to the top of his neck and scales were lightly scattered on the right side of his face. His eyes were a light brown, his hair was black and ridiculously curly while the only portion of his face that wasn't covered in scales was close to a light mocha color.

The person standing next to him was a woman and she was about half a foot shorter than him. Her scales were metallic gold in color and covered her legs- stopping a bit past her waistline . Her entire stomach was shown before the scales started again an inch or two under her bust and continuing up to her neck. Her lightly tanned face was on full display and she had the same eyes and thick hair as Srie.

"These are my parents." Srie announced, walking to stand beside them. "They requested your presence here."

I raised an eyebrow. "Requested?" I demanded. "Requested? There was no request! We were kidnapped! That one-" I jabbed a finger at Sallah who stood a couple of feet away from me. "Nearly bashed my skull in!"

"Lin-" Rose started.

"No, Rose!" I snapped. "We both could have died."

"We apologize for that." Srie's mother, Saith, apologized as Sallah began ushering people out of the room. "We didn't mean to hurt you. We needed- need your help." That caught me off guard. Why would underwater mermaid people possibly need Rose and my's help?

Realizing that I wouldn't stay quiet for long, Rose began explaining. "Saith and Naal are the king and queen down here." She told me. "They've been in charge for over thirty years."

"And now it's time for us to hand the Crown of Sasaka and responsibility of Chalaan down to our children, so that they can take over." Saith continued. "But, in order to do that, we need your help."

Rose gave me a pleading look, but I was reluctant to hear them out; part of me wanted to simply leave and go back to my bedroom on the TARDIS, but another, larger, part of me wanted to help. That part eventually won.

"Alright," I sighed. "What do need help with?"

Wanting a bit more privacy, Rose and I were shown to a smaller room in the castle; it was as richly decorated as the throne room and the halls and also had a window looking out to the ocean. The only difference was the size of the room and the table that sat in the middle of it. Rose and I sat on one side while Srie sat on the other between her parents. Sallah stood next to the king.

"Something you must first understand before we continue," Naal began. His voice was raspy but deep. "Ever since people from other worlds began inhabiting this one, we- the Challans- have been targeted."

"What'dyou mean by targeted?" I asked.

"You were up on the earth," Sallah reminded. "When you looked to their money, their statues, their art, what did you see?"

I had to think for a few moments. She had been correct in assuming that most of Space Florida had a common theme; it was on their clothing, their shop signs- hell, it was even crafted into their food. "Mermaids." I realized.

"They see us as Gods." Saith continued. "And, for generations, we have been hunted down. Luckily, we have found ways of hiding ourselves from them and they've never been able to capture us, but many had been wounded in their attempts in getting away. Some have even died from their injuries, including my youngest child." Srie took her mothers hand and I couldn't help but feel bad for them. I knew that even on Earth mermaids were being hunted. I had never believed in them, but I was rethinking a lot of my beliefs since I met the Doctor. "He was only ten."

"I'm sorry." Rose apologized.

Saith nodded. "Thank you, but it is not him we worry about now."

"My brother, Zsoric is set to take the crown and become king when the next full moon rises." Srie took over. "It is only five days away, but we cannot find him."

"He was last seen near the shores of Blellela two weeks ago." Saith said. "No one has seen him since."

"How could we help?" I asked. "We're not even from this planet."

Naal nodded. "We know, that's why we brought you here."

/

"This is insane," I said to Rose as we made our way down the pier.

Naal and Saith had been very clear about what they wanted us to do; We were supposed to sneak into a secret lab- which they had no clue of its location- break out Zsoric - who we weren't even sure if they were alive or if he was even there- and get him back to the sea- which was all dependent on us not getting caught which I was sure we would.

"Are you gonna be the one to go back and tell them that we're not gonna do it?" Rose asked.

"Not unless I want Sallah to cut off my head for treason," That chick did not like me. I had felt her death glare throughout the entire meeting with the king and queen.

"Then that settles it." Rose sighed. "We have to do it, we just have o figure out how,"

"Oh, I've already made up a little plan." I told her. She just stared at me while we walked and it creeped me out. "What?"

"Are you gonna tell me?" I rolled my eyes.

"Do you know how many people get caught doing whatever it is they're doing?" I asked, but didn't give her a chance to answer. "By explaining their entire plan in front of hundreds of people who can hear them. If you've forgotten, the penalty for crime here is death and I don't know about you, but I don't want to die. Let's get to the TARDIS and I'll tell you there."

The plan was simple enough; Rose would get the sonic screwdriver and the psychic paper from the Doctor while we'd pose as scientists at the only labs in Space Florida. We were sure that Zsoric was in the secret basement lab that was a hundred feet underground. How did we know about the secret lab, you ask? Well, I just explained what was going on; The TARDIS wasn't exactly my best friend at the moment, but it didn't want me to die for treason. I didn't exactly know what it was doing, but- after a few moments- the console made a beeping sound and a photo of a building popped up on the screen along with an underground scan that showed the secret lab. The TARDIS showed me how to get there.

"Thank you," I said with a smile before I headed towards the hall in order to get to the closet room. I heard a beep and turned around.

 **YOU'RE WELCOME.**

"Does this mean you like me now?" I got another beep.

 **ASK AGAIN LATER.**

"Okay, Magic 8 Ball." Wondering if there were cameras in the TARDIS, I continued out of the console room.

After getting dressed in a pair of black suit pants and a white button up and packing a bag, I put on a wig; it was a lighter shade of brown that I hoped would help me look older and a it was long and curly, which I hoped would help hide my face. I had no idea what these people did- scenes from movies and TV shows began to play in my head; they could be like those people on Orphan Black who kept track of the clones and hired people in their lives to keep track of them; this could be an entire planet of robots like in Westworld...I hoped not, I wasn't into that show and had no idea what they actually did. For some reason, I thought of Inception and realized I could be in a dream right now.

Shaking those unnerving thoughts from my head, I found a pair of black flats and pulled them on. Once I was okay with how I looked, I left the closet and entered the main room just as Rose came through the door. She held up the psychic paper and sonic screwdriver in her hands.

"Awesome," She handed them to me and I slipped the psychic paper into my back pocket and the screwdriver into my bra knowing that it'd brother me all day if I put it in my pocket. "What'd you tell him?"

"That we spent all the money he gave us on presents for my mum and we needed more so we could get some for your brother," I nodded. The Doctor seemed like the kind of person who'd believe that. Rose's eyebrows furrowed. "Did you do something to your hair?"

"It's a wig," I told her. "You have to go get dressed now; they're not gonna believe a little British girl in a shirt that says _'Surf's Up Brah'_ is a scientist."

"Yeah, about that," Rose shifted. "What happens if this doesn't work?"

"We die," I was way too nonchalant about that. I could tell from the look on Rose's face. "I mean, somehow the Doctor figures out what we're up to and saves us?" Rose still looked unsure. "How about I just go in?" I suggested. "The TARDIS is a smart machine. It can found me a way into the secret lab where they're probably holding Zsoric, I'm sure it can easily follow me on the cameras." I heard a beep and looked to the screen.

 **SHE.**

"Oh, sorry," I apologized before looking at Rose. "She can follow me on the cameras." But Rose was focused on the screen.

"What is that?" She asked and I shook my head.

"Nothing," I assured her. "Just how we communicate. Eight ball here isn't really digging me, so I've got to prove myself in order to keep it- her from making me go insane from lack of sleep." Rose looked confused. "Don't worry about it. Anyway, you stay here and follow me on the cameras. If anything goes wrong- like you see me get caught and dragged to my imminent death- get the Doctor and save me because I'm not entirely sure about this whole immortal thing I've got going on."

"Be careful," Rose ordered as I picked up my black purse and headed towards the door.

"Everything is gonna be fine," I told her. "I'm gonna get Zsoric out of the lab and then we're gonna take him home to his parents and sister...I promise." I added right before I left.

* * *

 **Next Chapter**  
The Willow Rose

With the king and queen of an underwater kingdom counting on her, Linnie sets out to do to the impossible and save Zsoric from Space Florida's secret lab, but will she be able to continue her mission when she spots a familiar face from Earth?


End file.
